


Everstar

by WriteandRoller00



Category: Black Panther (2018), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Freeform, M/M, Other, Would love this to be a comic book, let's see how good this is.
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-06-21
Packaged: 2019-04-06 14:27:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 38,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14058945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WriteandRoller00/pseuds/WriteandRoller00
Summary: When the world thinks it's finally at peace with itself after the Wakandans join the UN, one of the Earth's most ancient enemies awakens to revived their original plan of killing the species of homo sapiens and any other in their way. Unfortunately, the King of Shadow Demons will not allow that to happen with his people and their having long fought history with each other. While that problem is brewing, another one has presented itself for the King. A blue-haired angel had fallen into his life and he's not sure how to live without him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoy this!

The UN meeting was over by the time that the subjects in question were in the building, which meant time was running out.

This was stupid, going out in the middle of the day like this. It was bound to cause a big scene and then everything would go down from there since when doesn’t a big scene go down hill? Never. Time was still running out and there was no time to stop and think about every possible way that what was about to happen was going to go wrong. With the door to the meeting room in sights, he wasn’t too late and there was no sign of danger anywhere in the proximity. Mission halfway accomplished.

The door opened and the first to step out as he was fixing his tie was the princess of Wakanda, Shuri, and her brother with her as a mob of newscasters surrounded them. Great. Just what was needed, the media. He glared slightly, but walked forward, trying to the draw and attention to himself as the security of the UN pointed for the Wakandans to move over to him. He held out his hand to the Princess and shook it lightly. “Princess Shuri, King T’Challa, it is a pleasure to have you here in the UN. Please follow me.” he announced and started to walk.

“So who are you then?” Shuri asked, picking up her stride to match the man they were told to follow. “You look important with that badge, but I didn’t see you in the meeting room.”

“I’m sorry.” the man instantly acknowledged and showed her his badge quickly. “My name is Damien Umbra. I work with Foreign Relations.”

“Foreign Relations?” she questioned, crossing her arms over his chest. “Shouldn’t you have some bodyguards with you or something? I thought the U.S government would have sent some type of protection for their representative.”

“Sorry to inform you, ma’am, but I’m not from America.” Damien replied, checking his watch before looking back up at the Princess of Wakanda. “And I don’t need any bodyguards. I can take care of myself.”

Shuri took a quick look over the man as they walked and smirked a bit. “Well you definitely have the body for it, Mr. Umbra.”

The black-haired man chuckled and gave her look as if she was a kid saying that. “I appreciate the compliment, Princess, but I am not here to flirt.”

“Then why are you here then?” she asked, taking a few steps in front of him as they walked. “You don’t dress like the rest of the representatives in the room. And I can’t place your accent from the people in the room. It’s like a mix of British, Russian and German.”

“I’m here to make sure you and your people get back to your craft safely.” he answered blandly. “There are bad things in this world that even some of the most powerful humans in the world, such as yourself and your brother, shouldn’t encounter. I think you know some people have an eye on your vibranium technology and your resources. These beings won’t hesitate to kill you if provoked to do so, and unfortunately with this meeting opened to the public, you are now a target.”

Shuri was silent for a moment as she tried to process that information properly. Damien sighed and continued making his way to the front of the building. Time was still not on their side and he needed to get them out of her before something bad happened. As the Wakandans continued their way to the front of the UN building, two man with long wavy hair rounded the corner in front of them and stopped, standing in their way. They had sunglasses on over their eyes and golden suits covering them like they were in a disco music video.   


The man stopped walking and cursed under his breath for a moment before giving the communication to stop. Damien didn’t know what to do at this point, being that all over possible exits would be too dangerous to try and make a run for. Of course, that didn’t stop Okoye form trying to confront them with her spear. “Move.” she said plainly to the men.

The two men shared a glance before simultaneously answering, “No.”

“I will ask you again. Move now.” she repeated and the two men took a step forward. The leader of the Dora Milaje did not seem to like that and planted her spear into the ground, making the floor crack a bit. “Move before harm is done.”

A force of yellow energy forced the Wakandan back and nearly toppled over herself. She gripped at the floor, stopping herself from sliding any further and stood up again. Okoye was ready to fight them, but Damien blocked her from doing so with his hand. She glared at him, but the man ignored it as he took a step forward to confront the two men personally. “You boys should go home now. You’ve lost your fight and that proved nothing. They are under my protection and I suggest you leave.”

“The Shadow Demon seems to threaten us, brother.” one of them boasted. “For whatever should we do?”

“I know, brother.” the other one answered back, smirking at Damien with a look that meant that things are going south. “Let’s show this creature of darkness how we deal with vermin like him!”

This wasn’t supposed to happen, but what can you do? Two golden rods formed out nowhere and swung forward at the dark-haired man, but stopped as they were both caught. The two men in golden suits looked at the one in the black and tried to force him back more, but failed to do so as black smoke seemed to seep into the rods and fractured them down to shortened sticks. The two men were forced back, but stood their ground as the rebound of the break moved them.

Damien sighed and glared at the two men with a questioning look. “That all you got?”

The two men growled at him and removed their glasses, revealing pure glowing eyes of yellow and small feathers lining their brows. Their suits ripped and sets of golden wings formed where their shoulder blades were. Their fingers grew talons and their teeth grew sharp as they growled at the man who they were facing. “You face the Light. Prepare to perish, demon!”

Damien had disappeared into a cloud of smoke as time seemed to freeze on itself for a moment. He was replaced with a slightly taller man wearing black leather armor and a hood casting a shadow over his face as two white eyes appeared from under. They had no pupils and started to glow a bit. His hands seemed to have melted into the fabric as his fingers formed into sharp points and his mouth seemed to form fangs as well. “You angels should have thought twice about coming here without your leader to protect you.”

Then the fight ensued. Elsewhere, a woman in her early 20s was fully asleep at a desk. She was snoring loudly and her head of messy red hair was buried into her arms. She was out completely until a loud alarm went off in the room and forced her awake. She shot from her position and slammed her hands down on the desk, creating a thud which brought a guard into the room.

“Miss Alva, are you alright?” he answered, walking in with a worried expression. “Is the King in trouble?”

“What??” she answered, looking at the screen that popped up in front of her. She swiped left and opened up the message, sent from the King himself. She went wide-eyed for a moment and started typing in commands of the holopad to get a comm open between her and the one calling.

“Alva, you better be up right now!” a voice screamed, filling the once quiet room with sound again.

“Damien, what in the name of Mother Nature are you doing?!” she yelled back, starting an argument with the man. “Do you know what time it is right now here?! Where are you?!”

“The UN building trying to stop the Sun Angels from killing the Wakandans?” he answered back, like he knew that she knew what he was talking about. “Do you remember our talk last night, or where you too focused on fixing the Sender again?”   


“That’s not important right now! Why are you there alone?! You should have brought some guards with you, or something!” she began arguing again before turning to her console to start typing in some commands for the Sender to activate in the lower sector.

“Well what kind of king would I be if I couldn’t handle two sun angels by myself?” Damien countered with before grunting a bit since he probably either got hit into a wall or into the floor. “And it would be stupid to expose ourselves even more than we have.”

“You would be a dead king!” Alva yelled, slamming her hands down on the desk again, causing some of the holo-screens to fizz and flicker. “You are so lucky you have me right now, or you would be dead every single time you stepped out of the kingdom. Do you even have any weapon generators with you?!”

“That’s why I called you in the first place!” Damien argued, his voice struggling to yell since he was in the middle of trying to incapacitate one of the angels he was fighting. “I am using my bare claws and restraints right now! I need you to send my generators to me!”

“Argh...you are stupid sometimes.” the red-headed woman replied, running across the room in search of the generators mentioned. She opened the wall compartment on the back wall of the white room and saw that the suit that was usual there was gone, but the black and purple generators were still there. She groaned in annoyance and grabbed them off their mounts, closing the wall behind her. She placed the two generators on the pad on the edge of the desk and pushed the button next to it, making the generators disappear. “They’re on their way now. Be safe, please.”

“I will, sis.” the man answered back, clinging onto the wall with his claws holding him up. He signed off the call and heard the familiar sound of the Sender opening. “Finally.”

A black hole appeared in the ceiling of the hallway and the two generators fell through. The hooded figure chuckled and leapt forward to catch them before they hit the ground. He rolled, applying the generators to his wrists and landed in front of the one angel that wasn’t knocked out at this point. He concentrated his energy into the generators and made a pitch black sword and shield appear in his hands. Damien looked back at the angel and sneered.

The other angel growled, feathers hitched and raised. “You think weapons will help you?”

“It’s not the weapons that help me.” the man answered back, twirling his sword in his hand. “It’s the fact that you don’t have the power alone to fight me like this. Stop now and you may go without harm done to you.”

The angel stopped for a moment and considered the option. Damien froze for a moment, watching the sun angel think to himself. The angel dropped its weapon to moved back. The man questioned it for a second, but wondered if this was one of the angels forced into the sun angel army. He could understand that, but it would be very uncharacteristic. Suddenly, the four wings on the angel’s back fanned out and launched the angel forward in anger. The hooded man reacted by digging his sword up into one of his wings and bashing the sword into his head, sended them both crashing to the ground.

Both sun angels were out of the count now. Both of them were on the floor in panting heaps as the hooded figure discharged his weapons, making them disappear. Damien took his hood off and let his elven like ear poke out into the air. The area around his eyes were covered in black scales, like a mask, and they traveled down his nose. He settled back a bit, praising himself that his disguise hadn’t disappeared more. 

“That was awesome! You need to show me how you did that!” came the voice of one Princess Shuri as she ran from around the corner and crowded him as she tried to feel the material of the leather armor Damien was wearing. She pulled up his wrist to see the generator and started examining it. “It’s a hard-light generator. Is this were your weapons come from? And why is your fave covered in scales, or is it a mask?”

“Umm…” the dark-haired man didn’t answer as he watched to two angels melt into a glowing light and fade away into nothing. He sighed in relief as he knew they wouldn’t be coming back. He turned back to Shuri and pushed back a bit, trying to get away from the incoming crowd. “I should be going. You weren’t supposed to see that.”

He looked around at the crowd that formed and flinched a bit. The Princess of Wakanda looked at him strangely and posed a hip out with her arms crossed. “You’re not really from Foreign Relations.”

“What gave it away?” he joked, trying to get himself in the middle of the crowd.

“Then who really are you?” she countered back.

Damien smiled at the young girl’s curiosity. “My name is King Everstar of the Shadow Demon Empire. My kingdom hides from the world in Antarctica as we protect the world from creatures like those sun angels you saw me fight. I rule all of my kind and we never share our secrets with the world, for it would be its undoing.”

“Then why are you telling me.” Shuri remarked, pushing herself closer to him.

The man chuckled, snapping his fingers as he muttered something under his breath. The whole room froze in time as little strands of blue light drew from everyone’s heads and into his hand. He clenched his hand tight and the energy disappeared as another portal appeared to his side like the one before. He walked forward and looked back at the girl before walking in, answering her question one more time. 

“I’m telling you because you will never remember this every happening.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien arrives home to his kingdom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

The other side of the portal was entirely different world.

The black void opened up to the edge of the dome, the freezing air from the outside nipping at the back of Damien’s armor. The portal closed and the empire before him was stunning in radiance that couldn’t be found anywhere in the outside climate and structure of Antarctica. The reason for it was that it took billions upon billions of years to build up and make into the grand domed city it was at the present date. Damien could only thank his ancestors for it.

The dark-haired man walked down the stairs into the city, watching as people ran around and minded their business with their daily activities. Children were running around, playing with their neighbors as their parents watched carefully on the side of the streets. The buildings around them gleamed with the artificial light that beamed down from the glass dome, reflectant of the actual sun from that barely shone in the Southern Hemisphere. The glass displayed the atmosphere from over South America, which was partly cloudy. Everything was natural from it, even when it rained, since all the water came from melted ice.

When the people watched Damien pass, they waved as some bowed their heads in respect. The children would greet him happily, the man stopping for a few minutes to chat with the little ones. He would continue on into the main part of the city and watch as the homes and buildings came to resemble something of out of a fantasy book. The city had many large towers and homes for the residents, but the biggest building was in the middle, as it was the royal palace. Mostly only the royal guards and the royal family lived there, but if a family needed shelter, it was always offered.

The marketplace was busy as well as the man made his way through. People were selling their items and food to others as were buying them. Children were making their way to school, or at least heading home from it. The large square before the palace was large, holding the major of the people visiting as the guards outside the palace were watching peacefully. Damien smiled as he walked through the square, but stopped to watch a group of kids play with an orb light. One of the children must’ve been generating it with his gifts as it was passed from child to child.

One of them, a little boy, caught the ball in his clawed fingers, but tripped over his paws as he fell backwards. Damien rushed forward and caught the child carefully with his tail, using the pointed tip to stead the child and help him back to his feet. The child looked around and smiled as he recognized Damien behind him. The little boy’s claws clung onto the man’s tail as he bobbed it up and down, giving the kid a little ride before returning him to his friends, who were playing across the square.

“My, my, my, how the King has grown.” a woman called out and Damien immediately recognized the voice. He turned around to see one of the ladies standing by the fountain and how her horns were pressing out of her head like a ram’s. “Now what has brought the King to leave the kingdom?”

“Melody, I would watch that forked tongue of yours.” Damien warned, making a gruff stance before her. His horns waved back on his head, curving up and down once. His elven ears were tinted their usual black as hers were a dark purple. Her tail flickered behind him as she inspected her King’s intentions. “It will get you into bad places.” he continued.

“Like where? Your sheets, maybe?” she teased, claws coming forward to press against his armor-covered chest. Immediately the woman was pushed away by his tail and he glared at the woman.

“I think you have forgotten that I don’t date those of the female gender, in any species.” Damien countered before turning to walk away. He lingered a bit as his tail wiped a bit in hidden anger. “But I admire your efforts. Maybe try one of the guards, and maybe they will fall under your spell.” Some of the other woman at the fountain giggled at that and Melody stormed off to yell at them.

Damien smiled and made his way to the front gate of the palace, the guards opening them upon his arrival. His paws hurt from being in such uncomfortable human-made shoes for an hour. His feet didn’t fit in them, with his claws constantly digging into the leather. His tail twitched and spasmed from being tucked away in his shirt and pants. He didn’t like human clothes, as it was too confining to his extra appendages.

He walked his way through the palace until he reach the science wing, where no doubt his captain of the guard was awaiting him with a frown on his face. “My liege, your sister has been yelling profanities at the top of her lungs for the past half an hour. Where have you been?”

“I was visiting my subjects, like a king should.” Damien countered, taking his turn to walk beside the other male as they walked down the hallway towards the labs. “A good king familiarize himself with his people, for the better he knows the people, the better he is as making decisions for the people. The children will know me as their king for years to come and would wish for them to know I am kind and gentle instead of mean and ruthless.”

“The effort you are putting into being a just ruler is showing, my lord, but your people grow worried.” the captain warned. “The threat of the avians has become greater since the Avengers became distant. And with their final break a few weeks ago, we have to prepare for the war that we never wanted to have.”

“That’s what a king is always worried about, Malcolm. But I trust your heart to be true to the task of keeping the people safe.” the dark-haired man reminded, placing a claw over the captain’s chest.

There was the slamming off a door made both of the men break their interaction to see at the pissed red-headed woman at the end of the hallway. Both of the men’s tails instantly moved between their legs and took a protective step back. Malcolm was less scared than Damien was, but that was only because the woman wasn’t mad at him, but at the king. She marched down the hallway, grabbed the king by the end of his pointy ear and tugged him off down back to the lab she was in. The captain of the guard smiled and waved to his king. “Have fun, my king.”

Alva was beyond pissed. Her brother went behind her back on a mission that she didn’t authorize. He stole her technology from her vault without her permission. He also didn’t tell her when he was leaving or where he was going, which scared her half to death. The woman tugged the king into her lab and pushed him forward as she slammed the door behind her. She then turned with a crazed look and smiled. “You are so lucky that I’m human right now, or I would have killed you.”

Damien sighed and rubbed his ear. “Then consider me lucky. I don’t see why you are so mad. I did tell you when I was leaving, did I not?”

The red-headed woman glared at her brother and her look softened after a while. “Well, you could have left me with a note, or something. I’m your sister, Damien! You gave me a heart attack when you called me in the middle of a battle!”

Damien sighed and took off his weapon generators, handing them off to the woman as he walked to put his armor back up onto the wall, his royal black attire replacing it. His attire was a normal outfit off what you would think a prince would wear, his top laced with gold and purple. He didn’t wear pants, since it wouldn’t work with his canine-shaped legs and tail. He did wear a crown, but only at royal events so it wouldn’t get lost. He turned back around and stretched his legs a bit, being able to move them out of the leather shorts of his armor set and the metal shin guards.

“I needed the generators.” the king backed up, seemingly calm about the situation. “And I am your older brother, Alva. I can handle myself in battle. I was trained to protect my kingdom and that is what I’m doing.”

The woman growled with an aggressive attitude, but threw her hands up and walked back to her monitor. “I can’t argue with you! I swear mom and dad predicted that we would fight and trained you to win all our arguments!”

The man chuckled and walked over to his sister, adoptive clearly. “Or maybe it’s because I’m a predatorian and your homo sapien. Being evolved by radiation has its perks.” He was thrown a glare from the woman as he watched her work over her shoulder, but he didn’t mind.

Damien eyed the lab quickly, watching the walls. There were standard white, but had copper and bronze ascents in the shape of computer circuits. It was his mother’s idea, may she rest in peace. She was always into human technology and other types of working with engineering. Alva took after her before her death and ended up being the palace’s main advicor and engineer. Of course there were others who helped, but she was more of a political figure than anything else. Alva helped with the advisory and all troop outposts, being that she was dating the captain of the guard. Damien had the thought that the two would overthrow him at some point, but dismissed it for the reason of he knew malcolm sigh he was a kid and Alva was his sister. All in all, his people in command were a good selection. He could see why King T’Challa had his sister as the chief scientist.

“How is our patient?” Damien asked, eyeing the stairwell to the one of the top floors of the lab.

“Which one?” Alva asked back, looking at her brother with a glare, since she was still oftened. “We have two people here that really shouldn’t.”

“The sub-avian I brought in last week. How is his progress?” The king watched as his sister brought up a diagnostic on her holo-screen. It showed a full body scan and all of the sub-avian’s vitals. The scan was a current reading, one taken about a minute prior since the bed they had the avian in was a medical bed as well.

“He’s healing.” the woman replied to the dark-haired man as he paced around the workbench. “His radius and ulna in his right wing are still fractured. His tibia in his right leg is healing nicely, but he won’t be able to walk fo a while. All the open wounds he had are closed and he’s still asleep. He hasn’t woken up since you brought him in.”

“Good.” Damien replied, moving towards the stairs. He was going to give a visit to their guest. “Did you find anything on parentage? Who was taken care of him when he was little?”

“Not sub-avians.” Alva answered, throwing a holopad to the king as he turned to catch it with his tail. “Humans adopted him. His original parents must have abandoned him, or something. I wouldn’t be surprised if the avians killed them. And that brings us to the question of why he’s here in the first place?”

Damien contemplated on that for a moment before answering. “I brought him here because he’s young. He doesn’t deserve to be thrown into this war just because he has a pair of wings. He didn’t recognize me when I met him before  _ she _  attacked, meaning that he wasn’t involved in avian culture.”

“So you want to turn him.” the redhead answered back. “And if  _ she _  has an interest in him, then why bring him here? The kid’s going to get hunted if he ever steps outside of the kingdom.”

“Opposed to what?” the king answered, his tail whipping behind him as he argued. “Letting his die of wounds in an alleyway? Letting the human authorities get to him and send him off to a lab for experimentation? The predatorian race has tried to keep the world as blind to the fact that there are higher powers in the world than humans and I do not plan to make the presence of us known yet.”

The woman sighed, sitting back in her chair. “Then what are you going to do when he sees you? He’s gonna freak.”

“I’ll go in with my sapien mask. He won’t know the difference.” Damien answered. “And I’ll show him what I really look like when he’s ready. And you are human, meaning that you can help me get him accustomed to living here.”

“I’m an engineer, not a psychologist.” Alva countered as she went back to work. “Don’t blame me when Malcolm tries to kill the poor kid.”

“Oh, I won’t.” The king smirked at his own sentence. “I don't plan on having Malcolm anywhere near him during his stay.”

Alva looked at the door to the lab before slamming her hands down on the table and standing up. “Excuse me, but I have to go murder my boyfriend for letting you get away with this.”

Damien chuckled as his sister fumed. Because of all the radiation around the kingdom’s dome, age seemed to have a weird effect on the residents. Damien, because he is a predatorian, ages at a normal rate, where Alva, being a homo sapien, ages much slower. The human had been living here since she was a child, but aged at the same rate as her older brother had been. Damien was born during the time that America had its revolution against Europe and Alva came into the family a few years later.

Before the king made his way out of the main level of the lab, he remembered something. He turned around and looked back at the woman arming herself with weapons. “Alva, what is the sub-avian’s name again?”

The woman looked up with a mace in hand and sighed. “His name is Keegan. Keegan Lux.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The little angel upstairs wakes up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Keegan woke up with a stinging pain in his body and he didn’t want to move.

Everything around him was warm and fuzzy, giving him a good excuse to just fall back asleep. He reached out his hand, confused on why it feels like it’s wrapped in something, and kneaded at the fuzzy blanket he was tucked into. He flexed every part of his body and sighed as he let his head sink back into the pillow. His vision was blurry and he couldn’t really see much since the room was so dark.

Something started hurting on his back and he decided to sit up. He pushed himself up from the pillow carefully and sat forward as he tried to stretch his wings more. But something stopped his right wing from unfolding. He started to slowly panic as he struggled to relax his wing, but winced as it started to hurt. The teen carefully moved his wing around to find that someone had put a cast over his wing over the joint. It was as thin as a layer of gauze, but he couldn’t move his wing at all.

That’s when Keegan went into a full blown panic.

Someone had seen his wings was the first thought that when through his head as he looked around the room. It didn’t look like a hospital room and it certainly didn’t feel like a hospital cot. It was fleshed out with soft pillows and blankets and the mattress wasn’t hard. The room was also a red color with dark accents. There was a balcony to the outside and it looked like he was somewhere tropical. That really confused the angel because he lived on the West Coast and not in South America.

He scooted himself across the bed, trying to make sure his damaged wing didn’t hit anything and let himself slide off onto the floor. But that didn’t work because his right foot couldn’t balance his body wait and sent Keegan to the floor after he winced in pain. The angel looked back at his leg and saw that his shin and ankle were casted as well and in a lot of pain. The cast was the same material as the cast on his wings.

He looked out the window again and wondered what had happened. He couldn’t remember anything had happened before he woke up. Did his parents know where he was? He froze at that thought and started to shrink in on himself. He must have been kidnapped, right? Keegan started to move towards the open balcony, feeling a cool breeze coming in from there. He carefully made his way to the wall and pulled himself up onto his good leg.

When he made his way out onto the balcony, he froze in awe of the outside. Every building was a bronze collar and reflected the sun’s light. It was warm, but not sweltering hot. The city looked like a mix of modern and renaissance, some of the buildings made of stones and some made of metal and windows. The area seemed to only be the center of the city too, since the buildings went on and on into the distance. Keegan had to hold himself up on the banister so he could keep balance.

“I see you’re enjoying the view.” someone spoke behind the angel and his feathers hitched upwards on his wings as he jumped. Keegan quickly turned around to see a man there. The man had black hair where it was combed back all the way on the top with the sides buzzed. His eyes were a chocolate brown color and seemed to draw in all the light in the room. He was tall, 6’5” tall, and seemed to be well-built. “Do you mind if I accompany you?”

Keegan was scared. Was this the man who kidnap him? Was he drugged? Why was his wing and leg broken? All of the questions in his head raced as he stared at the man with a fearful expression. Keegan was only 5’2”, even if his wings made him a little bit taller. The man continued to walk forward towards the balcony and Keegan climbed around on one foot to grab a book in the room and throw it at the man.

The man caught it before it hit his face, his hand moved faster than the boy could see. He held the book out in front of him and read the title, smirking. “Romeo and Juliet, huh? A good choice in book, but I don’t think it was necessary to throw a book at me.”

“Stay away from me!” Keegan yelled, hugging the wall for protection. “Don’t touch me!”

“I didn’t plan on doing so.” the man answered. “I was just asking if you were enjoying the view of my kingdom.”

The boy froze. He looked at the man sitting on his bed and back out at the world around him outside of the room. The man said this place was his kingdom, meaning he was a king. Keegan started panicking again as he realized he just throw a book at someone who was royalty. He tucked in his wings, trying to hide them from the man as he got onto his knees. “I-I’m s-so sorry. I didn’t mean to o-offend you at a-all. P-Please don’t k-kill me.” he begged, lowering his head.

The man chuckled and knelt down next to the angel, tilting his head back up. “There’s no need to do that. I expected you to be somewhat afraid of me, but I would never kill someone innocent. You think I kidnapped you, yes?”

Keegan nodded slightly and fluttered his wings a bit. The king was really close to his face and seemed genuinely nice. He was still startled a bit, but the dark-haired man seemed to not want to hurt him. “I-I just…” the boy started, but seemed to lose his train of thought.

“I will explain some things to you, but I think your wing and leg would be more comfortable on the bed.” the man answered, holding his hands out to help the angel up to his foot.

Keegan slowly rose, flapping his undamaged left wing to help him balance but fell forward after standing. He yelped as he hit the man’s chest and looked up as the king smiled at him. The two moved slowly towards the bed and Keegan crawled back into the bed, minding his leg and the growing blush on his face. He climbed over the covers and sat on the bed with his legs crossed as much as he could. “...Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” the king answered back. He sat on the edge of the bed. “I’m guessing you want to know why you’re here, or why you have broken bones, or who I am for that matter.”

Keegan nodded and let his wings relax a bit. His left wing fanned out onto the bed where his right was still stuck in its casted position. The boy seemed to be more relaxed than he first was, but that was also because there was still a minor blush on the kid’s face from when he face-planted into the king’s chest. He didn’t know how toned the man was until now.

“Well, my name is Dracon Everstar, the king of Domum.” the king started out. “Of course, everyone just calls me Damien Umbra on the outside world since my actual name is a little strange.”

“Outside world?” the boy questioned, looking back out the window at the tropical empire. “But it looks like we’re in South America, or the Caribbean. And I’ve never heard of a kingdom named Domum.”

“Well of course you haven’t heard of Domum. It doesn’t exist in the normal continents.” Damien answered back, looking over at the open balcony. “We’re actually in Antarctica.”

“A-Antarctica?!” Keegan asked, rubbing his eyes, looking back outside as Damien chuckled. “But there’s palm trees, and grass and no snow! How is this Antarctica?!”

“There’s a dome, Keegan.” the king answered, still laughing a bit. “The dome regulates the same temperature as South American climate, as well as provide the same sunlight and weather as places like Brazil and Ecuador. The water he get is melted from the ice and snow had falls from the blizzards outside. In here, we are safe and hidden from the outside world.”

“‘We’?” the little angel asked. “What do you mean by ‘we’? Are they other humans here, too?”

“No, we don’t let humans here, even if we do protect him.” Damien explained. “We here don’t want our secret being known by the humans, since humans can be very violent when pushed to the limit. You’ve seen what happened in New York, Washington D.C., Sokovia, and even all over the world in different countries and regions. Humans, especially the ones with weapons and powerful abilities, show not know of our existence quite yet.”

Keegan nodded and flexed his wings a bit. The king seemed very relaxed for having an outsider in his kingdom. The teen looked back outside and wondered if he could go home. If the king didn’t want anyone knowing that this place existed, then would he ever get to see his family again? He started to curl up, moving his one working wing to wrap around his for comfort. He didn’t want to stay here forever. “Can I go home?” he asked, a little nervous.

“No.” the dark-haired male stated with a firm tone. “It’s too dangerous for you to go home. You’re going to stay here, in the kingdom where you are safe from harm.”

Keegan didn’t take that answer too well. “But I want to go home. I want to see my family. I don’t want to stay here forever.”

“Well you can, unless you want to get yourself killed.” Damien answered simply. “I already saved your life once, and I’m not doing it again.”

“But I don’t even know what happened!” the little angel yelled at the older male sitting with him. His wings flared a bit, white feathers raising with his elevated blood pressure. “My wing is damaged, my leg is broken, I have no idea how I got here, and you come out of nowhere protesting that I’m safe somewhere I don’t even know where! I know you’re lying to me! I know I’m probably drugged right now too and I’m seeing things that aren’t there! This isn’t real!”

Damien watched the kid break down into a crying mess. His face was cherry red and tears were like rivers down his face. His wings were shaking from the amount of fear, or pain he was in and he was curled up tighter than he really should be. He didn’t know what made the kid so upset, but he knew it was probably the confusion getting to him. He cleared his throat and gave the kid a calm glance in his direction. “You want to hear a bit of history?”

“No! I don’t!” the angel spat back, sitting having a hissy fit with the king. He glared at the man, his wings tightening against his back more and tearing flowing down his face as it was red from his crying. “Shut up and stay the hell away from me!”

“I sadly can’t stay away, since I rule this kingdom and you are under my watch.” the dark haired male answered back with a bit of sternness in his tone. The angel shot him a glare before burying his hand back into his arms. “But I think you still need to understand why you’re here. Wouldn’t you like to know?”

The kid was still not listening to the man, but gave a short nod to answer his question about wanting to know what the heck was going on. There was a mumbled “fine” before the angel went silent.

“Good.” Damien answered back. “Now a long time ago, when primates started evolving into man, the sun in our solar system had a solar flare, sending UV radiation across the surface of this planet and affecting the lifeforms that lived here.”

Keegan looked up from his arms, still crying but not shaking as much as he glared. “This sounds like a fairy tale...” he muttered, not believing this so-called ‘king’.

The man continued. “After the solar wave, two other animal groups started to evolve, but with abilities based on the UV radiations. One group was made of birds of prey, like eagles and falcons. They evolved into larger version of themselves, but with forward bending knees and hands. We call them avians, but there are a small class of sub-avians, avians that have mated with humans. The people who had seen them thought they were messengers from their made believe gods and started to call them angels. They live in the Arctic because there’s no human contact and it’s isolated.”

Keegan froze and looked back at his wings. He looked back at the man with an annoyed and confused look. “Now I know you’re just making his up...”

“The other group evolved from mammals that hunt, like wild cats and dogs. We call them predatorians. They look like werewolves almost, from what I’ve seen from human culture, but have mixtures of different animals. Humans call them many things; demons, dragons, and other monsters, but I prefer to use the term of shadow demons. Now these two races hate each other, one wanting to destroy humanity and the other wanting to keep balance. If any shadow demons found an avain in their home, most likely they would be killed on sight, but luckily I’m being nice by protecting you.” the other finished.

Keegan scoffed at the man, still not believing anything that the man was saying to him. “ Great story. Pfft, yeah, like I’m going to believe that I’m a different species and I’m part of this huge hidden people that live somewhere in the Arctic. Where am I actually? Or are you withholding that from me because I’m your hostage?”

Damien was losing his patience with the kid and glared, forgetting to keep his form stable as he talked with the kid. He didn’t like dealing with adolescents, since they didn’t cooperate and denied everything you tell them. It was frustrating and he started to growl a bit at the kid for being so rude to him. His eyes flickered to their yellow coloring and the black scales over his eye area formed, elven ears appearing as his teeth all sharpened in his mouth. It morphed like the features grew out of his skin and he growled at the kid louder to prove his point.

“You believe me now, kid?” he asked, his cat-like pupils forming tight slits as his inner rage grew, but he didn’t yell at the teen. He could already see how scared he was.

Keegan was so scared and shocked he couldn’t move his body. The man’s face morphed into something you would find from fantasy. He watched the scales and pointy ears grew from his skin as his teeth sharpened enough that the he could probably eat someone. But his eyes were watching him no matter what and he started to realized the story wasn’t a story. He should have listened. If he was the race with wings and the man was the king, the leader of the race that came from the wild beasts, then the king was going to kill him.

The angel scrambled backwards out of the bed and limped towards the balcony, not being able to move as fast as he wanted to with his broken leg. As for Damien, he simply got up from the bed and followed, his legs morphing back into their canine-like appendages as his paws formed while walking. Horns began to form from his temple, curving like waves back on his head, and a long sleek tail trailed behind him as it balanced his walk. Keegan pressed himself to the balcony as the man went from 6’5” to 7’5” as he towered towards him. He started to silently cry as the king made there little room to move. “Please, don’t kill me. I-I’m sorry for n-not believing y-you. I-I’ll listen this time, I-I swear!” There was a loud creak behind him, but he ignored it as his focus was trained on the man in front of him.

The king of shadow demons seemed to become worried a bit at the creak behind the angel and started growling in frustration. “Keegan, you need to get off the balcony railing! I can’t hold the weight of your wings!”

The teen didn’t listen, cowering at the yelling as memories came up in his head of multiple foster parents, ones who yelled and screamed at him for being a freak and having wings. Memories of punishments and abuse and fear came up in the angel’s head as more tears fell from the teen’s face. “P-Please...I-I don’t w-want to t-tie my wings u-up again…” he croaked up, seeming to be in the middle of a memory instead of reality.

“KEEGAN!” The railing creaked more and finally snapped apart, sending the teen falling off and screaming. Damien froze after he yelled the kid’s name, not being able to grab the kid fast enough before he fell off the balcony. The shadow demon cursed himself and looked over, seeing the kid was still falling with his wing slowing his fall a bit. The creature growled and disappeared back into the room as the kid fell.

Keegan was trying to fly despretaly as he fell, his broken wing not folding out because of its cast. He was thrashing around in the air, the wind harshly hitting his back and making it form a vacuum as he fell. He closed his eyes and cried, stopping his screaming as he knew somewhere in the back of his mind that he would probably die like this. He curled his wings around himself, trying to protect himself from the impact of the ground, but from a height like that, no one could survive.

Everything stopped moving as Keegan felt something catch him and hold him close, the wind getting blocked by something warm against his face. As a natural response, he grabbed on to whatever was holding him and curled up tighter to protect himself from anything that might hit him. He didn’t open his eyes, fearing he would fall again. There was movement, but it slowed as there was the sound of scraping across a metal floor of some kind of loud grunt above him. The world finally stopped moving as the something holding him dropped a bit and panted.

“Keegan?” a voice called, getting the blue haired angel to open his eyes. His vision was blurry, but a figure with dark hair, parted down the middle, and a styled beard appeared in his sight. The man used his thumb to wipe away his tears and stroke his face, worried lacing his expression. “Keegan, can you hear me?”

Once the kid’s vision cleared, he saw what was clearly the king from the room over him and holding him against his body. “D-Damien...?” he asked in a cracked voice, the screaming damaging his voice slightly. He panicked, remembering what happened and cowered away in his wings, wrapping his good one tighter across his body. “P-Please don’t kill me…”

“I would never, Keegan.” he stated back, running a clawed hand through his blue hair. It was relaxing, the angel’s scared expression softening a bit. “I’m sorry I scared you. I didn’t mean to yell or frighten you in any way. I just wanted to prove a point.”

“Oh…” was all the angel said before turning to curl up in the king’s arms, the heat coming off his body relaxing and warming. He felt weird, like something good was happening to him, but he didn’t know what. He just felt like being in the king’s hold was safe and calming, even if his species wanted to murder his. He felt like nothing could touch him here, and he could relax. He giggled, smiling as he buried his face into the man’s garments. “Point proven, your majesty.”

“Stop, no formalities. You are my guest, not my subject. If like the name Damien, then you may use it. Don’t be surprised if some others here call me Dracon…” He stopped mid-sentence as he watched the teen fall asleep in his arms, smiling softly. The king smiled, nuzzling the little angel. He stopped, realizing that the thing that Alva commented on earlier were becoming reality. He sighed, walking back towards the guest chamber.

Keegan was his guest. Nothing more and nothing less...for now.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Queen of Avians is pissed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

It was cold, but being that it was the Arctic, that’s normal. Ice, snow and frozen water everywhere and entrapping the animals that live on the frigid islands of the North.

Two bird-like creatures landed, talons and scaled feet sinking into the snow as they walked a short ways to a parting in a glacer, the two ice walls surrounding them as they walked through. It only took them awhile longer before they hit a barrier, one invisible to human eye. They walked through, wings clutching to their back as the barrier opened a small bit to allow them through. The two creatures walked through and the barrier closed behind them, it blocking the blizzard outside from the new habitat they had entered.

The whole structure was made of ice, the sound of talons clicking against frozen ground echoing as more creatures of the same species walked around. All who were of avian descent lived in this frozen city and thrive. The two avians that had entered the structure walked through the many halls, wanting to get their mission over with. As they walked, they watched as multiple sub-avians were dragged around on chains and forced into labors. They’re wings were pink and orange, after being whipped and cut, making blood stain their feathers permanently. The creatures handling them yelled insults and curses at them when one messed up or failed to do his job. That sub-avian would no doubt be killed after a while.

Finally after minutes of walking, the two creatures made it to a large door with two guards standing outside. Clearly recognizing the approaching two, the guards opened the door and allowed them pass, top pair of wings saluting as they walked passed the doors into the large room before them. The large door closed with a thud as the two guards resumed their positions, saying a quick prayer for the two who had walked inside.

The large room was covered with multiple treasures, some gold and some flora that you would not usually find in the Arctic. The walls were lined with gold and silver decorations, making the cold icy walls seem more feastive than their situation currently was. At the end of the room sat a throne, dubbing the room the throne room of the ice structure. A mass of feathers was standing before it, a figure with six wings and a large feathered crest forming what would be recognized as female human hair in a way. The two four-winged figures stopped and kneeled, letting their feathered crests raise in appreciation for the other.

The pure avian turned around and smiled, sitting back on the ice throne and flared her wings out as she addressed the two kneeling before her. “What news do you bring?” she asked, golden eagle eyes watching their every moves as one of the two answered.

“The King of Shadow Demons was found today.” the one looking up replied, wings semi-folded on his back. “He was escorting the King of Wakanda and the Princess after their meeting at the United Nations.”

The heavenly figure smiled with overbearing joy as she laughed to herself. “Excellent! Oh what a joyous day it is! It’s good to see that one of my plans actually worked! Now come on, where is he! I want to be the one to rip his beastly heart out of his chest!”

The two avians looked at each other before wincing physically, wings folding down all the way as they tried to figure out someway they would survive telling their leader this new. “The king...is not here at the moment, your holiness.”

The pure avian stopped for a moment and stared, relaxing a bit. “Oh, of course. Well...don’t just stand there. Bring him in here. I want to see his face when I rip out his internal organs and feed them to my birds of wrath!”

“Your highness, but-” the avian tried to continue, but the ruler kept on going. 

“I want him to know the pain his species has caused us for millions of years! To feel the agony and rage that I have for his kind and how they have foiled all of my plans!”

“Your highness, please-”

“To make him feel my wrath and show him how the world should run: with humans and any descendants of them on their knees before me so I rule the world with an iron fist! He will rue the day he made up-”

“The King got away!” the avian finally got a chance to say, a small bit of annoyance in his voice as he cut off the queen. “He defeated the soldiers sent to kill the Wakandans and erased the memories of the people watching to cover his tracks...your majesty.”

The queen of avians stopped, her face melting from victory to a smile of deceit and anger. She snapped her head towards the soldier, the feathers of her hairs raising as more blood raced to her head. Her black eyes blinked for a moment, staring at the soldier before seeming to grow darker as her six wings unfolded, them shimmering in the small amount of light in the room. “...what?” she asked, eye twitching.

The soldier seemed to shrink in on himself, the other not wanting to get involved as he moved aside. “He escaped through a shadow portal and made the public blind. The two guards that were killed were removed, but...he still got away with no trace of him left for the humans, or us to follow. Their hideaway still remains a mystery.”

The winged figure shifted her weight a couple times before sitting down on her throne and staring into scape for a moment, raising her hand to be in front of her face. The room was silent as the two avians seemed to cower in fear of what was to come when their leader finally spoke again. The tension in the room was murderous as the room seemed to become more full with light. The decorations of gold and silver shimmered as the sun seemed to be brightening the room, but not melting it.

Finally, the pure avians turned her clawed hand around and a beam of light was casted over the poor avian that told her the news, his wings starting to burn up with light as the rest of him incinerated instantly into a golden dust, staining the floor beneath where he was kneeling. The other avians panicked, in shock of seeing his colleague die, and bowed his head to the floor and hoped to avoid the same silent fate.

“Anything else you would like to inform me of?” the pure avian asked, pointy teeth evenly showing from behind her golden lips. The avian shook his head and bowed deeply to not angry the woman anymore. She smiled, folding her clawed hands together. “Good. Carry on.”

The male quickly got out of the throne room, almost running into one of the consorts walking in, quickly side-stepping to get out of the way to exit into the hallway. The female watched the male avian leave and look at the slightly pissed off queen that sat on the throne before her. She tucked her wings in and walked in, making sure to not seem threatening as possible to the other sitting there. The female made it to the center of the room and saw the pile of golden dust at her feet. “Another one, my queen?” she asked, quirked an eyebrow.

The queen looked up from her scowling mood and smiled, getting up from her throne to walk to the consultant. “Unfortunately, Vashti. I swear that none of these avians know how to win a war.”

“That’s because they don’t, since we haven’t been in one for centuries.” Vashti added, trying to prove a point that her leader wasn’t quite seeing. “Queen Celeste, you do realize that throwing the people into a war that we haven’t fought in ages is not quite the direction we should be going. I know after the death of your sister, you have been-”

“My sister meant nothing to me!” the leader of avians ranted. “She was a disgrace to the family line as a pure avian! Wanting peace with the humans, the low life humans of all things! She even mated with them, making disgusting little sub-avians that we know have to take care of! She was a horror to the true meaning of being an avian was! We are the top of the chain in life and we conquer all!”

The consort watched as her holiness passed the floor space. She sighed. “Yet the plan you seemed to come up with, without my knowledge, was to announce war on the humans and kill anyone who would get in the way? And you thought that the shadow demons would just let that pass? As much as I enjoy seeing you try to be yourself after the loss of your sibling, I highly advise you not to acclaim war on the shadow demons.”

Queen Celeste stopped pacing to look at her consort. She tilted her head and beckoned the smaller avian to follow her to the balcony behind the throne. The two walked, entering onto the balcony to see the area behind the castle of ice. The rest of the ravine that the avians had made home to was a frozen wasteland, causing the many people who lived there to be cold and without food for long periods of time. They were all hungry, starving and chilled to the bone from their home, no way out from it if they didn’t want to be captured by the humans or the avians. “Look at them, Vashti. Suffering in this frozen prison that bastard of a king put us in and all we can do is hope everyone survives. We can’t just let the shadow demons rule how we live! We need to fight back!”

“But the people don’t want to fight!” the female avian stressed to her queen. “They want to survive, to have their children survive and going to war is not the way to keep everyone alive! We should negotiate with the King to at least give us some food or technology to help sustain ourselves! We are dying more and more by the days, your highness, and we need to forget the war!”

Celeste stared at the other for a moment before sighing, leaning against the wall and watching her subjects. “You sound just like my sister...you were her consort before mine, so it would make sense. Vashti, the King won’t give us what we want. He only cares about his own people. His kind killed my sister for what? Being too close with humans, and being accused of hurting them when she wasn’t? He will never want to help us, so we must take what we need forcefully.”

Vashti sighed, knowing that’s not what she wanted. She wanted to destroy humans and shadow demons alike, just like her parents and the rest of her ancestors tried to do. This story of giving the people what they want to her was all just a game so she could become the queen, instead of someone else. She had gone throughout the world, commanding her warriors to find every trace of her sister’s heritage and have them killed. Queen Ruby’s family, except her persistent sister, were all dead by her own command. She was sad the kingdom had come to this, but it wasn’t her place to change anything now.

“And how to you plan on doing that?” the consort asked, looking at her queen with a saddened look. “The shadow demons have more advanced technology and more numbers than us. He might have weapon generators like them, but we won’t get into their hideaway, since he don’t even know where that is.”

The Queen smiled, nodded, but the smile seemed more like a smirk as she chuckled softly. “Don’t worry, my dear Vashti, our time will come. We at least know that the King has a weakness for protecting humans from harm. We cause a little disaster here and there, and the beasts will be so distracted helping the humans that we can get some...information about the enemy.”

The consort nodded before turning to look at the rest of the throne room. She remembered the parties and the holidays spent in this hall and they were amazing. None of Ruby’s children got to experience them, since they were scattered throughout the world now, and probably all dead. She hung her head in memory and let her wings spread out to show respect. The past queen was honorable, kind and very caring pure avian. She was all the sunshine and light that she ever needed in her life, since the two birds were very close.

“Remembering the past?” Celeste asked, walking forward to sat next to the smaller avian. “She was a good ruler, wasn’t she?”

“Yes.” the female said before smiling to herself. She was going to comment of something Ruby had once said when something panged in her chest. It took a moment for her to look down and notice the sword through her body, right through the heart and bleeding out. She looked up at her queen with a terrified and shocked look. “M-My q-queen?!...w-why?”

“I sadly can’t have anyone would supported my sister turn on me in my own kingdom, Vashti.” the queen commented, helping the little winged creature down to the floor as she began to fade out and die. She smiled with a sick smiled as the avian took her final breaths. “It was nice having you as a consort while it lasted. No one will stop me in my conquest. Not even a little avian like you.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keegan and Damien gets closer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

“So what does all of this stuff do?”

Damien looked up from the holo-screen he had in his clawed fingers and looked over to Keegan, who was admiring the different gadgets in the lab. He had decided halfway to the guest room that keeping him in there would be a bad idea since the balcony was broken. So he decided to keep him in the lab for now until he could get the balcony fixed. After their life-and-death situation with the little angel falling off the balcony, he decided to try and keep him inside for the majority of his stay until his wing was deal healing and he could fly. Until then, the king of shadow demons had to figure out a way to keep the kid occupied and do his job without angering multiple people. Right now, he was babysitting the teen in his sister’s lab since she was off somewhere with Malcolm.

“They’re things you shouldn’t be touching unless you want to get your hand chopped off.” he answered simply, putting his focus back on the report he was reading about recent supply counts and other important information for the kingdom he ran.

Keegan immediately pulled his hand away from the shelves of gadgets, flinching as he watched the creature he thought was human read some kind of paper. He crossed his arms over hiss chest as he hobbled over, being that his foot was still in that weird cast thing, and looked over the man’s shoulder, skimming the section of the report he was on. It was a bunch of numbers and things he didn’t understand, being that it was a bunch of squiggles and swirls. “What language is that?”

“Demonic Rune.” he answered, not even looking at the teen behind him. “Shadow demon native language. We came up with it, so it would make sense. I speak all human languages as well as some angelic texture. A king needs to know these things to be a good ruler.”

“Cool.” the angel answered back, flapping his wings with contentment. He looked around to see no one else was here except the king and him. He slid over a seat from the other side of the desk and took a seat in it. It was hovering off of the floor, sinking as he sat in it, but was amazed by how it was hovering off of the floor so easily like in all those sci-fi movies. He leaned over the front of the chair and waved his hand under it, feeling a strong force that seemed to hold it to the floor. “Woah! This is really cool! Did you design all of this cool future tech?”

“What? Me? No.” he answered, still not looking up from his report. “My sister made all of the tech in this room, but I just design the aesthetic of the room. Copper, black and white are very nice colors that mix together to show the technically advancements that we shadow demons use to help protect the human race.”

“You have a sister?” the angel asked, brightening up a bit, remembering his own siblings. “I have two brothers, but they’re both younger than me and not, you know, angels like me. I’m the oldest in the house and I was supposed to be going off to college in a few months...somehow, at least.”

“Don’t all human guardians like to pay for their child’s college tuition?” the shadow demon mused, tail flickering and swaying behind as he started to multitask his thinking to remember what Keegan was saying for later. “I’ve heard that human colleges are very expensive nowadays. I remember back when you only had to pay a few thousand dollars to get in and that was only thirty years ago. And you’re eighteen, I’m guessing? Shouldn’t you have a job by now?”

Keegan didn’t do anything to respond, but started to curl up into a little ball of feathers into the chair. He hated talking about his parents. His parents basically just hated him for what he was and who he was. His mother tried to be understanding where his father wasn’t the slightly bit happy with it. He would make him tie his wings to his back all the time, telling him that his wings would make him a freak and that no one would respect him for them. He always wore baggy clothing with skinny jeans because it made him feel the most comfortable. He would leave home a lot just so he could go flying or perch on some roof to think or clear his head.

It didn’t really get better throughout the years he lived with his family. His father would blame him for most things, tell him that because he had wings and he wasn’t like his family that he was a mistake and didn’t belong anywhere. Most night were filled with the blue haired boy crying himself to sleep and wishing he was different, that he wasn’t weird. When he was just becoming a teenager, he tried cutting off his wings so that he could be accepted. He locked himself in the bathroom for two hours, but had passed out from how many feathers he pulled out and how much his wings had started to bleed.

Damien looked up from the holo-screen and noticed that the angel had gone quiet. He placed the screen down on the desk and leaned forward, balancing his arms on his thighs as he walked the little teen with glowing yellow eyes. “Keegan, are you alright? Did I say something off?”

The teen’s head shout up from his arms as the memory of that night in the bathroom faded from his mind again. His olive green eyes had started tearing, small rivers forming as they raced down his face. He rubbed them off with the sweatshirt he was still wearing from the time he was first brought to Domum. “I’m okay...I just don’t like talking about my parents and what’s happened at home. You didn’t do anything wrong, I promise.”

“Alright. If you say so.” Damien hummed, nodding as he leaned back to finish reading his pad. He knew something was wrong with the kid if mentioning his parents put him in that kind of depressed mind state. He would have to look up the angel’s file once Alva got back.

Keegan stared at the demon before him and studied his body, bored with nothing else to do. The male had pointed ears, which made him look like a elf or a bat of some sort. Two horns curved out of his head as they made the man look almost like a dragon. His eyes were like yellow orbs of light as they shone over the mask of glossy black scales at covered half of his face from the bridge of his nose up to his bold eyebrows. His hair was long, slicked back but not hard. It looked fluffy and reminded him of a mullet if Damien had bangs, but he only had sideburns in front of his ears. His jawline was sharp, but curved with his small beard making points where his chin and jaw bone bended.

The angel didn’t stop observing there. He let his eyes trail down the man’s face to his well-toned chest and arms, which tugged nicely on the loose fabric of the top he was wearing, his formal tunic draped over the back of the chair he was sitting in. His hands, even with the claws on them, looked soft but sturdy at the same time. His abdomen was slim, but not skinny. It was well muscled and seamlessly morphed into his dog-like legs. The thighs of his legs had tights around them, showing the strong muscles he probably used to help him catch the angel earlier. The rest of his legs seemed the same, muscled and slim. His feet were like paws, claws drumming on the floor as he read.

Keegan felt his cheeks heat up severally as he scanned over the demon’s body, memorized in the sight. His tail seemed strong and with the pointed bone of the end, he could probably stab someone with it. It was like a snake, hypnotizing him as it waved back and forth behind the creature sitting in the chair before him. A million thoughts shot through his mind and he didn’t know how to process them. Why was this man so attractive?! Why the heck is he so perfect and strong and intimidating?! His face was a light shade of pink by the time he made the decision of hiding his face in his knees and covering himself with his wings.

Damien sighing, finishing the report and making sure he got all of the information down he was need for the next royal meeting. He stretched his limbs, hearing a satisfying crack in his back vertebrae before looked over at the angel that was shaking and curled up in the chair across from him. He became worried about the teen, thinking that the fall or the mention of his parents hurt him in some way, and moved closer to kneel in front of the blue haired boy.

“Keegan?” he asked, moving a hand to lightly cup over the teen’s hair. He remembered his mother doing the same whenever he had night scares. “Are you sure that you’re okay? You’re shaking.”

The angel peeked up from his arms and squeaked, not realizing the man had gotten so close to him. “W-What? N-No, I’m f-fine. H-Heh. J-Just...m-my parents again…” he lied, rubbing his face to try and snap himself out of the stupor he had gotten himself into.

“I’m sorry to hear about that.” the king answered back. “It’s always hard with adoptive parents, hm?’

“I-I guess.” he replied, not sure how to answer. He had just realized that the people that had caused him so much pain and hurt were not even his real parents. He didn’t even know who his real parents were at this point. He watched as Damien stood up and walked back over to his chair, grabbing another screen and clicking it on to read it. He looked down at himself and curled back up against, still not feeling completely safe here and knowing someone might come in and try to kill him. “I’m seventeen, by the way. I don’t turn eighteen for another month and a half.”

“Oh.” the king said simply, looking back for a moment before looking back to the holo-screen in his claws. “I didn’t know you were a minor still. I’m sorry.”

The doors slammed open and two figures walked in screaming at each other. The angel almost jumped out of his seat, clinging to the chair for stability as a woman and a male walked in fighting about something in a different language. They were screaming and roaring at each other, seeing that the male was a shadow demon like Damien was and the other looked human enough. The girl ended up punching him in the gut before she walked over to the main desk in the center of the room, pulling up a screen and punching in codes with her fingers.

“ _What was that about?_ ” Damien asked, walking in front of Keegan and walking over to his captain of the guard. He had switched languages to Demon’s Tongue for the other shadow demon so the angel sitting behind him couldn’t get involved. “ _I’ve never seen you and Alva fight like that before. Something the matter?_ ”

The other shadow demon stopped his paw into the ground, denting the floor and his tail furiously whipping behind him. The black scales over his eyes shimmered with anger over his African pigmented skin, fangs baring as he growled some more over his king’s shoulder at the woman. “ _My king, Alva is becoming crazier by the day. She is suggesting that we have a party right before the oncoming of a war!_ ”

“ _I’m just saying that the people should be able to have some fun, Malcolm!_ ” the redhead yelled back, not even caring to look at her brother and the other demon in the lab. “ _A party would be great! We haven’t had a party since Mom and Dad kicked the bucket, and I think everyone else would enjoy it! Ooh! We could have a ball, with formal attire and fancy foods and everything!_ ”

The captain of the guard clenched his hands and growled louder, a rumble vibrating from his chest as his eyes started to glow brighter than before. “ _Are you crazy, woman?! We don’t have food as it is! How are we going to throw a royal ball when we don’t have the supplies to do it! Our concern right now is continuing to help the population survive! Not to throw a party just for the sake of throwing one!_ ”

In the action of advancing and making himself more aggressive in the argument, Malcolm pushed the king out of the way and was directly in front of Keegan, who was cowering on the chair from all the growling and yelling that was going on. The captain hissed at the woman before looking down for a quick second, but had to do a double take to make sure he actually saw the kid there. His wings were clamped as much as they could against his back as he was shaking, hiding his face with his arms. “H-Help…” he whimpered, trying to avoid the demon’s stare.

“ _Intruder!_ ” the guardsman yelled, backing up a bit as he watched the kid squeak and whimper more. He growled, roaring at the end an advanced on the kid. His tail, which had barred thrones on it, lashed out and whipped around in anger as he looked over at his king, who had a panicked face at this point. The dark-skinned demon generated a shortsword from his wrist as he pointed it towards the scared angel. “ _You are trespassing in sacred grounds, avian! Prepare to meet your end!_ ”

The teen screamed as the demon ran towards him with his sword held in front of him. He scrambled off the chair and onto the floor, scooting away from where the guardsman had impaled the chair instead of him. A feral growl rose up from the figure as he took his sword out from the leather of the chair and looked at the angel with death in his eyes, teeth showing through his lips as he stalked his every movement. The blue hair was now shaggy and was pushed all over the place as he continued to scoot away.

Damien joined the match, stepping towards the scene that his captain and his guest were making. “ _Malcolm, stop! He’s not a trespasser! I brought him here seven days ago for healing!_ ”

Keegan saw the king step in behind him and he flipped around, getting up off the floor and clinging to the demon’s waist for protection. He looked up at his face, which should just as much anger as the other demon behind him, but decided that Damien would protect him. He started crying more, tears falling from his eyes as his wings pushed around his arms to protect himself. “D-Damien!” he cried out, his voice becoming very squeaky. “I-I don’t want to die! I-I’m sorry! P-Please help me!”

“What?” The captain of the guard became confused, hearing the angel speak English and switching to it. “Why does he speak English? Also why was I not inform of you bringing an avian inside the dome’s walls?”

“This is why.” the dark-haired male explained, carefully picking up the angel into his arms and holding him against his chest. “You scared him half to death. He is only a minor, Malcolm. He won’t cause a threat towards anyone.”

The angel’s crying continued as the teen dug his face into the man’s shirt and sobbed, wings quivering and shaking as if he was in a blizzard. He kneaded his hands against the demon’s shirt, trying to calm himself for the king, but couldn’t seem to do it. There was a warm hand touching his wings and he froze, going stiff. It took a second for him to realize that it was only Damiens, and he relaxed into the king’s hold, humming happily as he was surrounded by the demon’s warmth and comfort. “T-Thank you…” he muttered, leaning his head closer to the king’s neck to nestle it there.

“You’re very welcome, Keegan.” he answered back, motioning with his tail that Malcolm was excused and that he would talk with him later about the situation. The other demon left the lab, forgetting about the argument with Alva and proceeding on with his day. Damien sighed, glad that it didn’t escalate any further than needed and went to sit back down on his chair, grabbing the screen he was reading as he did. He leaned back, allowing the angel on his frame to have as much room as needed. Currently, the teen was playing with his sweatshirt and staring at the holo-screen, trying to see if he could read it.

Alva walked over from her main desk and took a seat in the other chair, watching the two of them. Although her brother didn’t seem to show any interest in the angel other than protectiveness, she could tell that the little angel in his lap had been lovestruck by the demon. There was a small blush forming over his cheeks as he would glance up at the male’s face and his wings were twitch and flutter every time he was pick at the king’s shirt gently. Even the way that he had gone to Damien for help instead of running away showed how much trust he had in the demon only have meet him maybe two hours ago.

“So how is the cast working out for him?” she asked, interrupting the silence in the room.

“Hm?” the king questioned as he looked up from his report. “Oh, they’re doing fine. He’s been walking on it without problems and his wing seems to healing fine.”

The redhead flinched hearing the kid had been walking on his injured foot and gave her brother a weird look. “Walking on it?! Why in the name of mother Earth would he be walking on his foot?! He’s supposed to be in the guest room resting!”

“Is she a doctor?” Keegan asked, looking over at Alva was she started arguing with the king.

“No, that’s my sister Alva.” he answered back, seemingly ignoring the yelling. “She thinks that she’s the boss of everyone in the palace, but she’s just upset she’s the younger sibling and doesn’t have any powers like everyone else does. She is human after all.”

“Hey!” the redhead yelled as she became offended. She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at them for a moment. “Wait...why is Keegan down here in the first place?”

Damien paled, not wanting to tell his sister that the teen had fallen off the balcony and almost died. He could feel Keegan tense against his body and his wings shift as they clamped down on his back. “There’s something wrong with the room. I decided it would be best for him to stay down here until I can get it fixed.” he tried to say as kingly as possible.

“And what exactly was wrong with the room?” she continued to question, knowing that her brother hiding something from her. She usually did had multiple years of experience so at this point, she could tell when something was wrong.

Damien’s ears seemed to droop a bit as he point down his screen on the desk. “Well...I may have accidentally scared Keegan and...um...madehimfallofthebalcony.”

“What?! He fell off the balcony?!” she screamed at him and the king winced. “I can’t believe you! He’s a kid and you scared him off of the balcony! He could have died! You should learn to control your anger issues, you oversized mutt! You’re a king for crying out loud! And this is why I suggested the party was a good idea!”

“Well what do you suppose I do then, hm?” Damien started to growl back. “I apologized and seemed to have been able to get him to calm down. He was perfectly fine before you and Malcolm came in screaming at each other. Now he’s scared again and I’m trying to get him to relax. You screaming at me while he’s on me isn’t helping me do that.”

Alva sat for a moment as she looked at Keegan, who wasn’t paying attention to what they were talking about and just staring up at Damien’s face. His wings were shaking still and his hands were still hidden in the fabric of his sweatshirt. She glared before getting an idea that would make her very very happy. “While I’m getting the room fixed, I think that Keegan should stay in your room.” she answered smugly.

“What?!” he argued, making sure not to be too loud for Keegan’s sake.

“He seems to only trust you and if we put him somewhere else in the palace, someone might attack him.” she rationalized. “Unless you want him to sleep with me, who’s next door to Malcolm-”

“No! No.” Damien interrupted, putting his hand up. “Fine. I’ll keep him with me. But you better get the room fixed.”

The redhead smiled and walked off back to her computer. Keegan was frozen at this point with a reddened face. He was going to sleep with the king of an entire species of demons and he didn’t seem to mind. The angel looked down at his hands, which was shaking, but cluched them together against his chest hoping it would stop. He curled up a little tighter against the man’s chest, but soon relaxed after the wing petting started again. He sighed and nuzzled the man’s neck, who didn’t seem to mind the affection.

Maybe sleeping with him wasn’t such a bad thing after all.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keegan and Damien become roommates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Keegan suspected that being the king of an entire species meant that your had the most well protected room in the palace and no one would be able to get pass. Clearly, the angel was wrong.

Damien was carrying the blue-haired angel to his, now their shared room. The shadow demon wasn’t very happy about having to share his room with the teen, but he didn’t want the kid to fall off another balcony, so his room was the only room in the palace were the balcony was closed off by a gate instead of being completely open to the world. He wasn’t going to give the angel the key to the gate unless he was out there with him so they would not have a repeat of what happened this morning. He also was going to make sure no one came in this section of the palace after he talked to Malcolm about what Keegan was doing here.

Meanwhile, Keegan was napping on the king’s chest as they were walking around the castle. He had fallen asleep in the middle of the argument between Damien and Alva as his body started to recover again. His wings didn’t feel as painful as it didn’t when he woke up and neither did his leg. He wondered if it was the casting that was making his bones heal faster or there was magic at play. He guessed that if Damien was a demon, he could also use magic. He also wondered if he could use magic, but doubted it after he realized something would have happened by now if it did.

Once getting to the room, the king nudged the little angel in his arms awake as he stopped in front of the large bedroom door. “Keegan, I need you to wake up for me.” he said softly.

The little angel opened those olive greens eyes of his and looked around with squinting eyes as the world forced too much light into them. “W-Where are we??” he asked, sounding almost drunk from the amount of energy he didn’t have. 

“We’re at my room.” Damien said, placing the teen on the floor carefully so that his injured foot wouldn’t hurt so much. “I wanted you to be awake so you could see it.”

The demon pushed open the large copper colored door as he walked into his room completely relaxed as Keegan stood in awe at the doorway. The room was huge, about the size of the lab, which was much much larger than any bedroom he’s been in. The copper walls were lined with glowing shelves as they were filled with the glowing holo-screens that he had seen around the lab and Damien read. Even if all the ways were the same color, there were little accents over black and gold all over the place from personal belongings of the king, even a few things of blue and red from other decorations in the room. The angel was completely giddy as he walked into the room, being that he had a thing for beautiful aesthetics.

The blue-haired boy made he way over to the bed and felt it, loving the softness of it and how heavy it made him feel. His weight made the bed dip in and the blankets underneath him seem to cushion his legs and his arms when he laid down. Keegan crawled up towards the pillows and laid down on them, humming in happiness as they were really plushy and soft. He noticed most of the decorations on the bed were animal skins of browns and black, mixing with the color of the room. He wondered if the colors were so dark inside because of the temperatures a night, but remembered about the dome regulating the temperature anyways. He stretched out his wings a bit and cuddled into the bed, yawning a small bit.

“I see you like the bed.” the demon king observed as he took a seat on the side Keegan was looking towards.

“Yeah.” he answered back, a little drowsy. “Where am I sleeping?”

Damien chuckled a bit, finding the angel cute since he seemed so young and small compared to him. The way just finding a good sleeping spot would turn the feisty boy into a kitten as he would stretch and humm as he became comfortable. It was very adorable and he wondered why anyone would want to hurt him at all in the first place. He smiled at the little teen as the boy gave him a confused look for his laugh. “Keegan, you’re sleeping in that bed.”

Keegan felt his face flush and himself get shocked away. He was sleeping in the same bed as Damien?...He was sleeping in the same bed as Damien?! His wings seemed to have lifted on their own and the teen immediately sat up from his comfortable spot and stared with an embarrassed look at the male in front of him. This would have been easier if Damien wasn’t a hot piece of 7’5” hunk of meat that happened to have a nice chest, nice legs and a overly handsome face. But no, the gods had cursed him to suffer in silence as he had to sleep with the man he had gotten a crush on the moment they met.

“S-Sleeping with you?” Keegan asked, nervously. He was picking at the sleeves of his dirty sweatshirt. “But you’re the king. I shouldn’t be sleeping with you. I-I should just go back to the guest room and sleep there. I’d be fine.”

“No, please. I’m not having you fall off another balcony or getting attacked by one of my guards.” Damien argued, his tone of voice making the decision final and scaring the angel with the low growl that formed under his voice. It sent a shiver down Keegan’s spine and it changed the atmosphere of the room. “I’m keeping you here, where I can keep an eye on you and make sure you wouldn’t get hurt. I’m not having you fall out of another window until you can fly again.”

“O-Okay.” Keegan answered back, not really strong enough to argue with the king yet. He knew the demon wouldn’t kill him, but he knew that if he said something offensive, the dark-haired male might be at his throat with one of those claws. He pulled his knees into his chest and watched the king pull a royal tunic out from one of his drawers. He was all black, matching the tights he had on his thighs, with different gold, silver and bronze designs on the chest and the back of it. It made his dark-furred tail and scales-over eyes stand out more. It looked good on him and he blushed a bit when it matched his form a little too well.

The king looked back over at the teen and noticed he was still wearing that same sweatshirt he came here in and the same dirty skinny jeans. The roots of his wings were covered in dirt and blood, which wasn’t healthy and he started to get a whiff of the teen’s oder, which wasn’t too good. He growled a bit as he walked towards the door, hating that he had to leave so soon. He wanted to spend time with Keegan so they could get to know each other more. 

“I have to go to a royal meeting with the rest of my representatives.” he said, claws pushing his hair back a bit and out of his face. “Stay in the room and don’t wander anywhere please. I don’t want someone seeing you and trying to kill you. You also need a shower desperately. The bathroom is behind the first door on the left, and I’ll have the computer get you a pair of clothes in your size. I will be back later, Keegan. Get some rest.”

Then the demon king left the room, pressing the door closed behind him as he left the angel there in a stupor. After a while of daydreaming, Keegan finally snapped out of it and tried to remember what the male had said about a shower. He looked over at the doors to his left and there were two of them. He scooted himself off the bed and opened the one of the doors to reveal the bathroom with a shower. The little angel smiled and walked in, slipping off his clothes and heading to the shower to make his appropriate temperature with the water. Meanwhile, he went to go look at all of the shampoos he could use.

There were a lot of shampoos, which was kinda weird, but with all the fur Damien had, he wasn’t surprised. He saw the bottle of hair shampoo and took it into the shower with him, wanting to get all the built-up grease in his hair out. He spread his wings as much he could as the warm water seeped through the feathers and cleaned the dirt away from the creases. There was a soft groan of relief as the water seemed to wash away all the tension he had. He washed his hair, pouring some of the shampoo onto his hands before scrubbing all the dirt out of his short, fluffy hair. He let the shampoo sit as he washed the rest of his body and wings so that the scent of odor went away.

The angel took a while with his shower, letting himself be a piece for once without any fear or anger in his body. His wings became their usual pristine white with sky blue coloring the tips of each feather. He got out of the shower and wrapped a towel around himself so that he could stay warm without his wings against his back. Because of the water, they were heavy and dropping a bit lower than usual. He was looking for some kind of hair dryer for his wings, but saw there was a large vent by the door of the bathroom. The little blue-haired boy walked over and stood on it, trying to figure out what it did. 

A sudden burst of air forced through the grate and scared the crap out of Keegan, making him yelp as the air blew past his feathers and under his towel. The angel was quick to push the towel back down as the air continued to rush past his skin. The vent finally closed and Keegan was frozen on it as his feathers puffed up comedically, along with his hair. He brought his wings back down on his back and proceeded to walk out and never come in contact with that thing again.

When he walked out, a pair of clothes were sitting on the bed for him. They were regular clothes, surprisingly. A large blue sweater and some more skinny jeans, but this looked like something the angel would wear at home if he could afford it. He was a little disturbed by the fact that the clothes were just there, like someone had come with while he was in the shower, but he vaguely remembered Damien saying something about a computer selecting some clothes for him. He quickly slipped on the new clothes along with the undergarments he was provided with and hummed, feeling warm and cute at the same time.

He sat on the large bed and laid down on top of the blankets. He wanted to sleep, but one thing kept poking at his mind, or his stomach actually. He wrapped his arms around his middle as a hard growl erupted from his belly, making him realize that he hadn’t eaten anything in an entire week. He got up from the bed again and started looking for food around the room. He expected there to be at least a kitchenette in this big of a room, but there was nothing. He looked at the door and remembered there were no guards in the room, so he could probably go find something to eat around this wing. He sadly didn’t remember Damien telling him not to leave the room.

The copper hallways were deadly silent, nothing moving or walking around. The angel slipped out of the room, trying to not have the large metal door slam behind him. It took a lot of power for him to get the door open in the first place since he didn’t have the strength of a demon like Damien had. He slowly looked down each of the hallways before walking down one of them in search of some food. His cast was getting in the way of him walking faster or being careful. His mind started to wander on what kind of food they might have here. Maybe a lot of meat since Damien told him that they evolved from dogs and cats. He also wondered if that meant he liked fish since he was somewhat a hawk or eagle. 

Keegan looked at his arms and hands, wondering why he wasn’t as feathery as Damien said avians were. He knew he was a sub-avian, meaning that he wasn’t one hundred percent an avian, but he must be somewhat cooler than just a human with wings. Maybe one of his traits were that he had permanent blue hair. No matter what he did, or his “parents” did, his hair was always that sky blue color. It wasn’t dyed or colored in any sort of way, but the color matched the tips of his wings. He sighed, hugging himself as he felt himself grow hungrier. But something wasn’t right in the air.

The angel stopped in the middle of the hallway and looked around. His wings were twitching non stop since he rounded the corner. He looked down at the floor and say that he was stepping on a little block that had been risen off of the floor. He took his foot off of his, not having any shoes on at all, and looked to see that the block didn’t come back up. He was puzzled by it until something snapped in his head. There was a reason they weren’t another guards in this area. The wing was laced with traps that no one would see.

The metal floor under the blue-haired boy folded down and Keegan slipped with the weight of his wings. He scrambled to hold onto something, but his hands couldn’t grip onto the metal floor that had folded down. His fingers managed to hang him off of the edge, but the slickness of the shiny floor made him have to kept griping at the edge. He was panting and puffing out his breath as he was starting to panic about not being able to hold on. Finally, the floor panel retracted and the teen fell down into some sort of garbage chute as he slid down into the depths of the palace without anyone knowing he was there. 

Keegan landed chest first onto the floor of some kind of metal room. He grunted, having hit himself a lot of the way down, but remarkably his casts were still in place and not broken. The angel pushed himself up on his knees and looked around the room. It smelt like death and rotting corpses. The room was completely void of any meat or decaying bodies, but it still smelt like it. The teen coughed as the smell made his throat close up and his eyes water. He covered his mouth and nose with the color of his sweater and tried to figure out where he was. The walls were silver and had rusting chains on them. He didn’t remember since a room like this.

There was the sound of metal claws dragging against the floor as something metallic walked towards him. Piercing red eyes lightened up the room as something large and with four legs made its way over to the small teen. There was growling and something heavy in figure coming through the darkness as it stopped and towered over the little teen. “My my my. Another avian so soon? I didn’t know that you were regulars.” the beast stated, teasing the angel in front of him.

Keegan stared for a moment in complete fear. Was this another shadow demon? It didn’t look like one, but how would he know. “U-Ummm...I-I’m sorry for intruding...p-please don’t kill me.”

“‘P-Please don’t kill me.’ Ugh, you making this like a sappy horror story.” the thing called out sarcastically. It waved its paw around like it was gesturing to something. “As much as I love doing my new job, I hate it when people beg. You’re making this really hard for me, kid.”

The angel’s wings seemed to clamp down hard than before and he tucked himself into a ball as the beast approached him again. He growled and knocked the kid onto his back, grabbing the angel’s wings and pinning them painfully on the floor. The thing loomed over him, leaning down to sniff his body before growling with a toothy smile on his face. The thing seemed to be having fun with the teen. Keegan yelped and started to cry as he finally saw what the thing was.

It was a giant robot wolf that looked like it was going to eat him. Keegan screamed, struggling to get away, but the robot was quick and put his teeth over the angel’s neck and pressing a bit. That got become silent and still, but he was still crying and sobbing. He had been knocked off a balcony, almost killed by a demon and now he was going to be killed by a giant robotic dog. He felt his world go dizzy as his breath seemed to become shorter as panic took over his body. “P-P-Please…” he gasped out.

The robot scoffed and smirked. “Sadly I don’t do please.” The wolf growled and then lowered his muzzled to hover over the angel’s chest. He licked the spot were Keegan’s hearts was and lunged his head forward as he-

“ULTRON SIT AND DESIST!!!”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien is a little upset.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Damien was a little pissed at this point. He didn’t need to be saving Keegan for the third time in one day.

He was in the middle of a royal meeting with all of the other representatives of Domum and he was at peace with himself for once today. He knew that Keegan was safe in his room and no one could hurt him, which made his mind wander into daydreaming about the little angel in his possession. Most of the meeting was being written down in a report anyway and he could just read over the notes if he missed something.

His mind wandering to seeing the little blue-haired boy sleeping with that cute outfit he had picked out. The sweater and the skinny jets would make him look like a child, innocent and pure as he slept in his large bed. He could see the little angel curled up under the blankets and slipping into dreamland. His soft blue hair would be swept over his face and his hands would be tucked up in his sweater sleeves. He would be waiting there for him when he got back and they could have dinner together in his room before he put his guest to sleep. He could see that fluffy blue hair against his neck as the little angel slept up against his chest with his little hands curled up on his chest.

Unfortunately, that daydream was strongly interrupted by an alarm going off in the pocket of his tunic. Damien quickly snapped out of his foggy state and excused himself from the meeting, taking the holo-screen out of his pocket to read. It was an alarm for the Royal Wing, meaning that one of the traps had gone off in that wing. And the first thought that came to mind was that someone had found out about Keegan and was going to kill him. So, the king sprinted off towards the wing in hopes he got there before whoever set off the trap did.

When he got back to his room, his panic then set in when he didn’t see Keegan anywhere. He wasn’t in the bathroom, the closet, on the balcony or in bed, like he was supposed to be. He sat on the bed and felt the area were the angel was sitting and realized it was warm still. Then he realized what had happened he became a little pissed. The king went back out into the hallway and his tail slipped between his legs in worry. He couldn’t have gone far. His leg was broken and he was probably hungry. He was low on energy and tired. How far could the boy get?

Then there was a scream and dread set in. The demon ran, fear fueling his sprint as he made his way to where he heard the screaming from. He stopped in the middle of a hallway about two corners from the room and looked down, seeing the trap trigger had been pushed down and locked into place. He knew that trap lead down to the basement underneath the lab, since they were holding their other patient there for the meantime. So Damien made his way to the lab, which was about two floors down from the Royal Wing.

By the time he got there, his other patient was already doing what he told him to do if any avians fell down there. He walked halfway down the stairs as he watched Keegan become frozen in fear of what the robot dog was going to do to him. Before the metallic wolf was able to start, he growled out something to them to get the dog to stop. “ULTRON SIT AND DESIST!!!”

His growled voice shook the room as the dog took a step back to look at the person that had just walked in. The dog did an eye roll with his red optics as he smiled. “Well, if it isn't Mr. King of Demons himself. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Get off of Keegan.” Damien answered, walking into the room and snapping on the lights. The room brightened to see that there were a bunch of chains lining the walls and it was slightly stained with blood stains. His claws clicked against the floor as he walked towards his other guest with anger fuming in his yellow eyes. “You are not allowed to eat him. I get to deal with him.”

“I didn’t know you kept guests, especially ones with wings.” Ultron retrotted, walking away from the frightened angel who choking on his own breaths. The canine sat next to Keegan as the demon came over to help the teen up on his knees. He had a very unamused look on his face as he watched the boy cling to Damien as a lifeline. Tears were in the angel's eyes as he buried his face into the king’s tunic, but the robot could tell he was pissed. The dark-haired man had the look of rage in his eyes, which he was holding back so he wouldn’t yell at his other guest. His claws were slightly dug into the kid’s sweater since they were sharper with aggression. The wolf’s tail was still as he dipped his head down. “I didn’t mean to scare him that much. It’s the programming.” 

“No, it’s fine. It’s not your fault this has happened, Ultron.” Damien said back with a bit of bite in his voice. Of course he knew that, but he was more upset with Keegan. What was it with kids these days and ignoring adults? Did he know here the first thing he said before leaving for the meeting? Don’t leave the room, it couldn’t get any simpler than that. A small growl formed under his breath as he stood up with the angel in his arms. “I’m sorry about him dropping in on you. I know you wanted to be alone while you were here. It’s my fault for not locking the door when I left.”   


The robot wolf nodded as he watched the little angel. “He’s amusing, at least. After the whole ‘hiding in the corner of the deepest part of the internet and crying after my own creation killed me’ incident, the little twerp gave me some old fun that I missed.”

Damien glared at the robot and Ultron’s mechanical ears lowered, a nervous smile forming as the demon king’s growl got louder. The metal wolf backed away from him and went to sit back in his pile of cushions in the back of the room as the king huffed and walked out. The shadow demon walked out of the room and closed it behind him, tail still and tense as he made his way back to the room. Keegan was still shaking, trying to get his breathing under control and his wings to stop shaking.

The walk in the Royal Wing was dead silent as the two made their way to the king’s room. Keegan had finally calmed down enough where he could breathe normally again and he wasn’t shaking. He looked up at Damien face and it was cold. He was scared, knowing that in the back on his head he was probably in trouble. His wings curled up further against his body as he tucked his head in against his chest, his arms holding his stomach as the feeling of silent anger and rage was present from the king. They both made it back to the room, the door still open from when he left, and the king dropped Keegan on the bed before silently turning to the closest to pluck some of Keegan’s feathers off of his black tunic. The room was still with tension as the two didn’t say a word.

“Are you mad at me?” Keegan was the first to speak after their walk of silence, voice small and full of fear. He knew the demon could pull him apart if he will it and he didn’t want to die today. He just wanted to get through the day without something bad happening to him.

“I’m livid.” Damien answered back, voice a growl as he cursed something in Demon’s Tongue under his breath. When he was finished cleaning his attire, he turned around to look at Keegan with death eyes. His teeth were baring through his teeth as he walked towards the bed, but didn’t sit. “I was in the middle of a meeting, Keegan. I told you to stay in the room. You’re lucky that it was only Ultron that knows about you and not another one of my guards.”

“I-I didn’t hear you say that…” Keegan whimpered, not wanting to look at the dark-haired male as he spoke. “I was hungry…”

“Oh you were hungry, were you?” he asked back, mocking the angel as he paced in front of the bed. “Well why didn’t you say so? I’m sure that everyone in his palace would have given you food before putting a spear through your heart!”

Keegan felt the tears start slipping back as he covered his face with the sleeves of his sweater. His legs were curled up against his chest as he hugged himself. This was the Damien that made him fall off the balcony. Where did the caring, nice man that he liked? “Y-You’re being mean, Damien…” he cried out.

“I’m being mean?!” he roared, eyes coming just one yellow lens. “The demon king is being mean?! Oh woe is you! You want to see mean?! I’ll show you mean!!”

The king thrusted his hand at Keegan’s neck, claws out all the way as the angle screamed and cowered at the attack, curling up and crying louder. But the attack never came. Damien’s hand had stopped right before the teen’s neck. Seeing the angel whimper and cry filled him with regret and sadness. His eyes went back to having irises and pupils and his hand dropped to his sides as he own tears fell. His tail was between his legs as he waited the angel cry into the bed in fear and fright of the demon that had saved him so many times. What had he done? Why did he hurt Keegan like that? Why did he become the monster again?

“I’m sorry.” the demon choked out before turning and walking out the door, closing it and locking it behind him. He leaned against the door as he let the tears go down his cheek and get stuck in his trimmed beard. Damien could still hear Keegan’s soft crying through the door with his senses, and sighed. “I’m sorry for causing you so much pain and grief. This is all my fault.”

It was four hours before the demon king came back to the room. Keegan had stopped crying about an hour after he had left and buried his head in the pillows. He heard the “I’m sorry” that Damien said before he left, probably to go back to the meeting, but he still didn’t feel any better. The angel laid there for another hour before getting up to walk around the room and tried to forget that ever happened. He didn’t want Damien to be mad at him, since he was giving him a new home. Did he ruin his chance? Was Damien going to send him back home to his “parents”? Keegan didn’t want to go home to them. He felt like the palace was more of a home than his past one was.

It wasn’t until two hours after that did the demon king make an appearance. The meeting was over and he had gone to think about his actions. He shouldn’t have yelled at Keegan at all. He knew the kid was tired and it was understandable that the teen was tired and probably wasn’t even paying attention to what he was saying. It was also understandable that the kid was hungry after not eating for an entire week and his body did need food to help him heal. He hadn’t told his sister what he had done, but he knew she would find up sooner or later. Right now, he needed to make amends with the little angel staying with him.

So, he went get Keegan some “comfort” food, he remembered humans calling it. He opened up the Sender and teleported himself to America to shop for some food for Keegan. He got some snack foods and some other meal foods that he knew the teen would eat if he wasn’t with him to get dinner. He was planning also to install a little mini-fridge and a microwave so the kid could eat something when not getting food from the main kitchens. He bought it all and went back home, carrying all the stuff he bought back to the room.

When he entered, the air in the room was still extremely tense. He walked in and looked at Keegan, who was sitting up against the gate to the balcony and staring outside. The king quickly set up the mini-fridge and the microwave were the bedside table was and move the table to the other side of the large bed. Once that was done, he put all the food that need to keep cool in the fridge and store the rest of the snacks in the cabinet in the table. He sighed, dusting his hands off against each other. He turned around to see Keegan was staring at him with fear.

“Keegan...um...I’m sorry for my behavior earlier.” he started out, trying to smile and be more friendly with the angel. “It was inappropriate of me to yell at you when I knew you were probably tired and not listening to me at the time.”

“You tried to kill me…” Keegan argued back, a glare getting shout at him. “You said you would protect me, but you tried to attack me and hurt me...you broke your promise.”

Damien’s chest started to hurt with guilt as his tail curled between his legs and his elven ears lowered a bit. “I know. I’m trying to make amends for what I did earlier.”

“And you think I’m just going to forgive you?!” the angel said as pent up anger seemed to explode out on Damien, who flinched back a bit in surprise. “You yelled and screamed at me when you knew I just had the life scared out of me! I was crying and you still threatened me like I wasn’t really upset! You’re starting to act like my...m-my dad...please don’t be my dad.”

The little avian before him wrapped his arms around his chest as tears began to fall again, making him shake and whimper. Damien could feel how scared he had made the teen and nodded to himself as he promised to not do anything like that ever again. The demon took a knee in front of the blue-haired angel and held his arms out slightly as he silently offered a hug. “I’m sorry, Keegan. I’ll try to control my temper around you in the future. I’m sorry I scared you and made you feel in danger.”

The teen at first ignored the hug, turning around and holding his chin up as he wiped the tears away from his face. He looked down at his sweater and froze. Damien had done so much for him and he was still afraid that the king had made the decision to send him back home. He picked out his clothes and helped to heal his injures. He gave him a shelter and was protecting him from the people who were trying to kill him and the demon had only ever yelled at him now. He looked back at Damien’s face and could see how defeated he was. He really meant his apology and all he was asking was of Keegan’s forgiveness.

The teen sighed, smiling a bit and turning to fall into those big strong arms of his. He felt himself get pressed back up against the demon’s chest and his head went to its favorite spot in the crook of Damien’s neck. He nuzzled his nose there and smiled, loving the huge warm hug he was getting from the tall monster of a man holding him. “Just...promise not to yell or scream at me anymore?”

“I promise, Keegan. I’m sorry for the way I acted and I hope you can forgive me.” he said again, hugging the little angel and enjoying the feeling of those soft feathers on his arms.

“Yes, I forgive you, you big ass.” Keegan joked as his mood seemed to brighten up as his wings fluttered against Damien. He smiled, relaxing into the demon’s hold as he stood up. He wrapped his legs around the male’s waist and blushed as he pushed himself up against the king. He was smiling though as Damien deposited him on the bed.

The demon king was smiling now too, placing the angel down and opened up the mini-fridge. He smiled as he pulled out two sushi boats from the shelf they were on and held one out for Keegan to take. “So I know you were upset, so I bought some food for you to eat in here while your leg and wing are still recovering. I have some snacks in the cabinet under the bedside table and some energy drinks if you need them. In the fridge, I’ve got meals you can microwave if I am out somewhere and I didn’t order food for you from the kitchens.’

The angel’s face lightened as he ripped out the plastic package and started stuffing sushi in his mouth. He ate everything on the plate, stuffing some of the sushi into his mouth so it gave him chipmunk cheeks. He looked up at Damien and smiled when the demon gave him a look that said “seriously?”. He sat down on the edge of the bed and ate one of the sushi, not finishing before the tiny boy in front of him. It amazed him how so much food he had been able to see in a small amount of time. The little teen finished and pushed all of the food down his throat, taking in a gulp of air afterwards.

“Thank you, Damien.” he thanked the demon as the other finished his sushi. The blue-haired angel fell back on the bed and sighed, feeling full and relaxed more than he did as all earlier. The demon threw out their trash and took off his tunic and undershirt, revealing his chest to Keegan, who stared at it as a small blush formed again. He had some nice pecs with a well toned middle. His shoulders were beautiful and his hips were nice and sturdy as he put the shirt in the corner of the room. He walked back over to the bed and settled onto the blankets, laying back and smiling.

“I wish you a goodnight, Keegan.” the king said before closing his eyes and falling asleep.

“Goodnight to you, too.” the teen said back, watching the king. He looked down at himself and smiled, being really happy that he he forgave Damien and was now able to sleep near him. The little angel scooted himself over and carefully laid himself against the demon’s chest, taking in a musky scent and smiling. He release a little moan as he fell asleep next to the large male and slipped off into dreamland again, dreaming in him and this demon king together.

The night ended on a good note for the two of them as their small relationship blossomed.

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keegan has a nightmare.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

_ “Isn’t he beautiful? My little hatchling, Ezio.” _

_ Everything was blurry, like his eyes didn’t work as well yet. Everything seemed new and fresh as a warm blanket was wrapped around him as some type of nurse handed him off to someone sitting in what looked like a golden room. The world around him was bright and shimmery, making him giggle as he felt someone’s warmth spread over him. The little hatchling loved it, nuzzling into it as he chirped and bambled. The person holding him was covered in golden tipped feathers and was extremely tired. _

_ “Ma’am, do you want anyone in here while you’re taking care of your hatchling?” the nurse asked, wings bowed like their head full of green tipped feathers was. _

_ “No, please make sure to keep everyone out until further notice.” the woman answered, sending the nurse outside with who were presumingly the guards. The person holding the little hatchling sighed with a depressed tone as she looked down at the little ball of hair and feathers she held. It was a sin to mate with a human, everyone knew that, but it still happened and it happened to her very frequently. If anyone found out besides the ones she trusted, the little child would be killed and she would be dead as well. “What a burden you put on me, my little Ezio.” _

_ The hatchling chirped and peeped in happiness, not understanding everyone things his mother was saying, but seemed happy. His little wings, nicely wrapped in the blanket and not fully feathered yet, closed tightly against his back as he nuzzled the body next to his face. The mother smiled, happy but sad, and brought her child up to her face to kiss his forehead. “You have your father’s eyes, a nice olive green. Too bad he couldn’t be here to see you be birthed.” _

_ The little hatchling gurgled a bit as he headbutted his mother, giggling at the nonsense he was bambling. He was full of joy and cheer, since he had no idea what his future would be like. He wiggled a bit, one of his mostly feathered wings popped out of the blanket as it slipped. The other wing popped out and the little guy seemed very happy, testing his wings and flapping them. He giggled and nuzzled his mother’s face again, not realizing that she was crying.  _

_ The woman sniffled a bit, trying very hard not to cry, but was so happy that her child was so happy with his new found life. She was sad that she knew something would happen to him. “Ezio, look at me, please.” _

_ The little sparkling reacted to his name and looked up at his mother, chirping and patting her cheeks as he was trying to get her to notice that he could move his wings. The woman laughed, more tears falling as she closed her eyes to laugh. “Listen, my little angel, I love you with all my heart and soul, but something might happen to you. I need you to be strong for me, since your brothers and sisters have been taken away from me as well. I will protect you, I promise, but if  they take you away, don’t worry. I will come find you and bring you home one day. I love you, my little avian, and I promise that-” _

_ “I KNEW IT, YOU SPOILED LITTLE BRAT!!” Someone bursted into the room and the little child started crying immediately, everything becoming too loud for his new ears to handle. Another woman, slightly older than the mother, looked pissed as the nurse ran in after her in fear. The woman had purple tipped feathers, them all flaring out as her rage showed along with her completely black eyes. “YOU HAD ANOTHER ONE, DIDN’T YOU?” _

_ The mother’s wings instantly formed around her child as she wanted to protect him, the little hatchling starting to wail and become afraid of the other person in the room. “Please, Celeste! Let me kept at least one of my children! You’ve sent away or killed all the rest! Let me keep this one!” _

_ The other avian stormed forwards and tore the child from the mother’s arms as guards held the mother back from grabbing the child back. She screamed and shrieked at the queen as she walked away with her child, examining him as he continued crying out for his mother. She ran her claws through his hair and sneered at him. “What a disgusting little thing. Let me guess, this happened on one of your ‘nights out on the town’?” _

_ “Please, Celeste! He’s only a child!” the woman called, trying to rip herself away from the guards to save her child from the queen. “It was an accident, but I still love him! Can’t you see that he’s beautiful?!” _

_ “Beautiful?!” the queen sneered, laughing a bit. “This thing was made by a human! The very beings we are trying to destroy and you think he’s beautiful?! He has no beak nose, no feathers on his head, and he doesn’t even have tail feathers! How can his little monster ever be an avian?!” _

_ “Once he’s eighteen, they’ll grow! They’ll be beautiful, just little his wings!” the other avian protested, tears pouring out of her face as she weeped. “He’ll be strong and powerful, just like us! He’ll have magic and have tail feathers when they grow in, but he need to wait until he is eighteen years old by human standards! Then he will be like us, have feathers along his face, have long tail feathers like us and he’ll be able to do everything you say he can, just please...don’t take him away from me…” _

_ The queen paused for a second, looking at the child in her claws. Maybe this would be a fun little experiment to see how right she was. “Alright then, I’ll make this a little test. If this child grows up to be eighteen and he shows signs of being like us, I’ll let you have him back. If not and he stays mostly human, then I’m going to kill him and make it hurt. We have a deal, brat?” _

_ The mother nodded, crying more, but was happy that her child would be safe for now. “...yes, we have a deal.” _

_ The queen chuckled, but stopped when she felt a tiny hand touch her face. She looked over and saw that the hatchling was patting her face and giggling, smiling and flapping his wings in joy as he made the woman very confused. The queen finally snapped out of her and growled in disgust. “What’s the little vermin’s name?” _

_ “Ezio.” the woman answered, still hanging forward from the guards arms. “It means ‘eagle’ in Greek. The name appealed to me since our race evolved from them.” _

_ The queen smiled, looking at the little child in her claws. Her pointy teeth didn’t appear very welcoming as she lifted a claw to his face. “Well then little Ezio, do you have a life ahead of you.” Then her hand moved and everything painfully went dark as there was the sound of someone screaming at the top of their lungs. Everything plunged into darkness and began to suffocate everything. _

Keegan woke up screaming for his life. He shot up in bed as he tried to regain his breath for a moment before trying to see what was going on around him. He was panting heavily as he gripped the bed’s heavy blanket as his wings feathers flared out in distress and fear. He frantically looked around to try see where he was after feeling everything was a danger to him. It took him awhile, but he realized he was in Damien’s room still and it was early morning, meaning the sun, or the dome’s image of the sun, hadn’t come up yet. 

“It’s was only a dream…” the angel said out loud as he felt himself calm down and try to figure out what his dream was about and try not to forget it. He was calm for a while before he heard something move behind him and he swung around blindly to hit the person’s face. He opened his eyes to see that he had hit Damien in the face with his hand and the demon king looked fairly startled. Keegan winced and retracted his hand. “I-I’m so sorry, Damien!”

The other male rubbed his face and groaned a bit as he looked at Keegan with sleepy eyes. “It’s okay. I’m fine. The better question is why are you up at 3:20 in the morning? We can sleep in today since I don’t have any meetings.”

Keegan became very closed-off and hugged himself a little, wings doing the same. He looked at his roommate with a worried look before sighing to himself. “It was nothing special…”

“Nothing special?” the demon asked, quirking his eyebrow and smirking. “You woke up, screamed and smacked me in the face. It’s hardly nothing. Tell me. Maybe I can help.”

Keegan let himself relax a bit, but realized too late that he had started to cry, tears pouring down his face. He hunched forwards a bit as he felt his mind remember everything the dream had showed him, leaning forward into Damien’s chest as he cried more. The demon reacted, wrapping his arms around the angel as he cried and rubbing his back while letting the boy calm down first. When he finally was able to speak again, he turned his head to be more comfortable. “I saw my mom. My real mom.”

Damien’s claws seemed to extend as he mentioned that. His mind seemed to wander as he looked at the blue-haired boy. “Oh...that’s good.” he replied, not sounding angry or happy.

“She had golden tipped feathers and she was so warm.” the teenager ranted on. “I couldn’t really see her face that much, but she kept calling me her hatchling. She said I had my dad’s eyes and I was beautiful. She told me something would happen to me and that she loved me. She kissed me and she held me, but I think she was crying.”

Damien wasn’t really listening, but he was trying to not let the fact that Keegan was remembering this anger him. He continued to pet the boy’s back as he thought of all of the things that could go wrong with the agnel remembering this, but it was a dream to him. The demon had to remember that the angel was too young to remember anything clearly, or know who anyone was, so he just listened and stayed calm. “What happened after that?”

The angel looked up at the demon king’s face and nuzzled his chest. “Another avian came in, right? That’s why they’re called? Anyways, she came in yelling and screaming and I was crying a lot. She took me from my mother and they had an argument. I think the other avian, the one with the purple feathers, she threatened to kill me when I was eighteen. Something about me not being avian. But I thought I was one.”

“You are, but not fully.” the demon replied. “You’re a sub-avian, meaning you’re half human and half avian. When any sub-avian turns into an adult, in human standards, you will start developing more avian traits, like tail feathers and claws and feathers along your ears and chin. That’s it though, but most sub-avians don’t live that long.”

“Why not?” the teen asked. 

“Because that avian with the purple feathers you saw, she’s the queen of all the avians.” Damien explained. “She doesn’t like half-breeds and usually kills most sub-avians at birth. She keeps some as slave, but once they turn eighteen, she has them killed.”

Keegan shuddered a bit and leaned into the hug a bit more, soaking up the warmness that Damien was giving off. “What will happen when I turn eighteen? Will she find me here? Wait...is that why I’m here in the first place? Is she coming to kill me?!” The angel started panicking as he sunk further into the demon’s chest, trying not to be paranoid about this.

“Shadow Demons protect humans, Keegan.” Damien tried to explain the best he could, running a hand through the angel’s blue hair. “You’re part human and we got a signal two weeks back that avian activity appeared and I found you when they left. You were injured and I could have left you there to die, but I didn’t. You had a concussion, making you lose your memory temporarily, and I brought you here to protect you. And now, I’ve seemed to have endangered you even more.”

  
“No!” Keegan jumped up and held the demon’s shoulders, gripping them. “No, you haven’t! It’s a dream, Damien. It probably wasn’t really. I believe you when you say that this avian queen kills sub-avians like me, but I’m safe here. I’m safe here with you and I know that frome how many times you’ve saved me...I’m sorry for being such a problem.”

Damien wrapped his arms around the angel’s waist and shook his head. “You’re not a problem. I forced this on myself. It’s not your fault, trust me. I love having you here. I’ve been alone for so long and it’s nice to have someone I can care about in my life again.”

The angel blushed, smiling as he nuzzled his face into the king’s chest as he pressed himself closer to him. His wings fluttered, stretching out and flexing back. Damien’s tail seemed to wag as he noticed the angel’s embarrassment, a toothy smirk replacing his sad look. He looked down at the angel as Keegan looked up at him. They both seemed to be in the same state of mind, Keegan giggling. “I’m so glad to have a good friend like you, Damien.”

If you were a shadow demon, you could have hear how hard the demon’s heart shattered into a million pieces. Keegan flinched, realizing that not what he wanted to say at all since he was hiding his crush on the demon and looked up at Damien with a nervous smile. Damien nodded, hiding the fact he was completely heartbroken, and smiled back. “Thank you, Keegan. I do as well.” he answered, smoothly.

Suddenly, the door slammed open and an angry Alva and Malcolm stormed in with weapons in hand. Keegan yelped and fell forward, pushing Damien back onto the bed with him from where they were sitting. The two lowered their weapons and stared at the scene before him, Keegan completely flushed as Damien groaned as his tail was pinned under him. Malcolm huffed and left, not wanting to be apart of this, but Alva smirked as he leaned against the door frame. “So this is what the screaming was all about.”

Damien pushed Keegan off of his gently as he got up and went after his sister ash she escaped down the hallway. The angel laid there on the bed, thinking exactly was Alva was and blushing harder, covering his face. He just friendzoned his crush and everything was why too hot. He groaned as he sighed out, trying to calm down again. He was going to hate this night for the rest of his life.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien has some wild daydreams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Damien was sitting in another boring meeting, reading the same report over and over again in his head before it was too much to bare. 

The royal representatives were fighting over what to do about the fact that avian activity was getting more and more active, but the king was getting tired of this conversation. Alva and Malcolm were trying to get them to calm down, but once a bunch of old demons get started ranting about something, they don’t stop. Damien didn’t like the fact that this upcoming war that everyone knew was going to happen was making so much panic. This war might not ever happen in the first place, but everyone loves to panic at the fact that they were all going to die one day. 

The demon king’s mind started to wonder to different things, blocking out the meeting and trying to have some peace at mind. He remembered his mother used to show him how to ignore the things people would say in all these meetings by just staring at a wall and zoning out, so it looked like he was listening. He really didn’t need to be at these meetings, but all the representatives would rat him out to the public for not showing up at a very “important” meeting, but every meeting was the same. They talked about the new updates in the amount of supplies they had, the amount of money in the treasury, or whatever had more and less in storage than the prior week. He hated it, since the old hags would start ranting about something and never get off it.

The only good news he had was that their friendly basement robo-dog was finally coming out of his shell more around everyone else. Every time Ultron was with someone else than Damien, he was go into attack mode and try to bite their head or tail off. The A.I. seemed to still think everyone was going to kill him after Sokovia, so with the added base code in the body he was using being “guard/attack dog”, he really didn’t have anything else to rely back on. He had no weapons, besides his teeth and claws, and all of his internet access had to be denied so S.H.I.E.L.D. or more importantly Stark couldn’t find him. The demon king never wanted Stark to come to Domum. Never.

The only other person Ultron had been warming up to slightly was the blue-haired angel that was taking resident in the palace at the time. Keegan seemed to like spending time with the robotic dog after learning what had happened with Scarlet Witch tearing out his motor engine and Vision blasting his mind to pieces. The angel seemed to provide the sympathy that even Damien couldn’t give. The sub-avian would sit in the basement area with him, just talking or would bring dog toys down to keep him occupied. Sometimes the king would watch, when he wasn’t busy with other stuff he needed to do, but he trusted Ultron to not kill Keegan when he wasn’t around.

Soon, the king’s mind wandered to Keegan, wondering what he was up to. The sub-avian had been here for a week and a half and seemed to be very clingy after that one nightmare he had a few days ago. He seemed to remember that night the most exciting, since Keegan looked very adorable with him sitting against him and telling him about his dream. The teen’s blue hair was all messy on his head and he didn’t really mind when he accidentally fell forward on his chest when Alva and Malcolm walked in. He imagined what could of happened if they didn’t walk in, how he would have held the little angel against his chest and maybe even confessed. He could tell that Keegan became very flustered when Damien said anything too lewd or something complimenting his look. 

The demon king smirked, seeing the angel dress in his clothes just for fun. All the shirts and tunics being way too big for him and the pants not even staying up on his legs, showing his boxers. He could see how flustered Keegan would be if he was watching, seeing his boxers and how modest he would be to cover himself up. He would find it cute and adorable. He could also see him trying to apologize for not being able to fit in his clothes and of course, Damien would forgive him. The little angel would be so embarrassed and tried to put on his clothes again, his cute little butt waving as he tried to put his skinny jeans back on.

Another image came to mind of Keegan sitting in his lap and him playing with his wings. Alva had finally cleared Keegan’s wing and his leg as heal yesterday and the little angel was so happy to have the cast off. He was fluttering and flapping his wings all day, like he was a little bird free from his cage. The demon could image combing his fingers through those blue-tipped wings and playing with them. The little sub-avian would be leaning against his back and making cute little noises whenever he touched a sensitive spot. He would whispered how good the angel was and how he was a great roommate. Maybe even put a little kiss on his hand before massaging his back and listening to those little groans. He’d rub in between the teen’s shoulder blades and would get a breathless gasp, followed by moans of happiness.

He didn’t realize how long he was in his daydream until he felt something wrong in his pants. He looked down and stared for a moment, standing up and excusing himself from the meeting as he decided to go to the bathroom to take care of something. All the royal officials looked at each other and ignored it, continuing with their argument about how much cloth they still had. The demon king was a little embarrassed with himself that he let his mind wander that far, but made sure to get everything out before going back to the meeting. Sadly when he got back, the meeting was over and all the representatives were glaring at him.

“What happened with you?” Alva asked she was walking out of the room. “You just left and you didn’t come back for a good while.”

“I..had a slight problem that needed to be take care of in the bathroom and that was it.” Damien answered back, a small blush of embarrassment appearing on his cheeks. 

Alva took a second to try and understand what he was saying when she got it, smirked and pulled her older brother into the empty meeting room. She closed the door behind them and started laughing, hard. The demon king just glared at her as she walked a bit away from the door and leaned against the table. “You were daydreaming about Keegan, huh~?” she teased, poking the demon’s chest with her finger.

Damien’s tail stopped moving, telling her she was right before he could even go against it. He stuttered to say what he wanted to say next and stomped his paw on the ground after she had started laughing again about it. “I-I was bored with the meeting and my mind just went there!” he complained, now hating himself.

“What was it about?” she asked, trying to drag the answer out of him. “Were you thinking of him eating something cutely, or was it him putting on a outfit you picked out from him? Oh, it was him and his butt, right? You always like looking at his butt, I can see it whenever he’s with you.”

“Would you stop?!” the demon complained. “I am not telling you what I want or what my mind was, so stop asking! And stop thinking that I saved Keegan just because he’s cute! That’s not it at all!”

The redhead shrugged and looked at her clock, gasping a bit. “Well then loverboy, you better go. It’s almost noon and Keegan will be waiting for you to bring lunch.”

Damien rolled his eyes, knowing she was still mocking him. He opened the door, walked out and slammed the door behind him. He walked down the hallway to try and figure out what he should get for lunch, since Keegan had eaten all the human food in the mini fridge and didn’t leave anything for him. Of course, he knew he would have to get food at some point, but his mind was other places. He was trying to think of a predatorian food that he might like. He knew the teen liked sushi, so maybe some kind of seafood dish. He ended up knowing what to order by the time he got to the kitchen.

Once the meal was cooked, he went back to the room smiling. He was excited to have Keegan try some kind of food from Domum and start to get him into the predatorian culture. He seemed to already love the clothing that was worn, mostly silks scarves and light clothing the helped with the heat of the city. The little angel had been trying on some scarves that were in his closest once and Damien commented on how he looked nice in them. He smiled to himself as his mind went down the rabbit hole, imagining him in just the scarves and nothing else. He killed stopped though, not wanting to have another problems and continued on his way back to the room.

Keegan was in the bathroom when Damien walked in with the food. He set it down on the bed and waited, hearing that the shower was on. He decided to make himself usefully by cleaning up the room a bit. He threw away some trash and made the bed, cleaning up the clothes on the floor and organizing the clothes that needed to be washed or put away. Once he was down, he grabbed a towel and walked to the bathroom door, opening it and just walking in to wait for the little sub-avian to be done.

Keegan sighed happily, letting the warm water wash the rest of the shampoo and soap off of his body. The last week and a half had been so great for the little angel without the stress of his adoptive parents or school on his back. He had been able to move his wings fully now with the cast off on his wing and he had been able to walk around without that stupid cast making him limp. Once he was all rinsed off, he got out of the shower, turned it off, and shook his wings out so all the water wouldn’t make them heavy. He sighed, opened his eyes and nearly screamed his head off when he say Damien leaning against the wall. He quickly covered himself with his wings and his face was completely red. “D-Damien!! W-What are you doing in here?!” he yelled.

“Getting you your towel since you left it outside?” he answered back like it wasn’t obvious. “Why are you hiding yourself? It’s not like you don’t see me naked everyday when I change out of my pants and into my short leggings.”

“But you have fur down there and I don’t!” the angel argued back, holding his wings together more. “Give me the towel and get out!”

Damien chuckled, handing Keegan his towel before walking out. He flickered his tail to slide against Keegan’s lower back and made the kid jump and blush more. He walked out of the bathroom, got the sub-avian’s clothes and put them on the bed while he sat and waited for him to come out. It didn’t take that long, since the kid came out with the towel wrapped around his waist and he shuffled his way over to the bed, snatching his clothes and getting changed in the bathroom. It took a few moments, but Keegan came back out with the clothes Damien had supplied.

The angel was wearing a pair of blue skinny jeans and loose tunic from Damien’s waradobe. It was one of his more casual shirts, but it didn’t have some silver designs on the tan fabric. The tunic was too small for the demon king now, so he decided to use it in Keegan’s attire and cut two holes for the wings. The kid looked happy with the clothes on and did a little twirl, fluttering his wings as he did. “Well don’t you look flattering~” the shadow demon commented, teasing the angel.

Keegan blushed and tried to hide his face. He couldn’t believe that Damien would just walk in on someone like that. He didn’t suppose that it was okay since it was his bathroom, but he was still embarrassed. “T-Thank you.” he answered back, talking a seat on the bed next to the demon king. “What are we having for lunch?”

Damien smiled, sliding over the dishes for them and giving Keegan a set of utensils. “It’s a predatorian dish called Noctem Piscis. It’s a tuna that we put in a sweet spicy sauce, let it sit overnight, then prepare in the morning to be eaten raw over sticky rice and seaweed. It’s kinda like sushi, but unmade and in a good sauce.” The shadow demon took out a pair of chopsticks and ate a bit of the dish, sighing since it reminded him of the old days when his mother would get this for him all the time.

The angel was already halfway down after the king had described the meal. He loved it! He didn’t know that food here could taste so good. He wasn’t a big fan of very spicy food, but the sweetness seemed to cover it up enough that it wasn’t too hot of a cold dish. All the fish was gone and he was almost done with the rice. He smiled at Damien with his mouth full of rice and swallowed before laughing with the demon. “Thank you for the meal.” Keegan answered back. “It’s really good.”

“I’m glad you like it.” the demon king answered back, taking another bite as Keegan finished up his plate. He was going to continue eating when his mind switched to seeing the angel getting himself covered in food, asking the shadow demon to get it off of him with his mouth. A small blush appeared as he continued staring at the sub-avian. He snapped out of it when he saw some rice sticking to his face. “Keegan, hold still for a moment.” he asked.

The teen stopped moving at the demon wiped some of the rice and sauce off of the corner of his mouth, eating it afterwards. The little angel blushed a bit, smiling shyly at the other. “T-Thank you for that. I-I didn’t see it.”

“You’re welcome, Keegan. Oh, I wanted to take you somewhere in the palace today that I think you might like.” Damien replied, smiling as he finished his meal. He took the plates and put them in the retrieval chute for the cleaners to get later. He walked over to Keegan, helped him off the bed like a gentleman and asked wordlessly for the angel to followed him as he waved his finger to. The angel didn’t know what was going on, but being able to leave the room was nice. He hasn’t really gotten any fresh air, since the gate to the balcony was always closed.

They left the room and walked down the left corridor towards where the lab was. Keegan held onto Damien’s arm, worried that someone might see them and try to kill him like Malcolm had almost. The little angel had his wings tucked back as much as they could as they walked around the royal wing. They turned towards where the main part of the palace was and the shadow demon covered the angel’s eyes for a second as they walked. “D-Damien?” the teen asked nervously.

After a few seconds, Keegan felt the hand move away from his eyes and the light come pouring in, blinding him for a second as his eyes adjusted. Once they did, the sub-avian was in awe of what he was seeing. It was a garden, a huge garden that was surrounded by open arched halls on each side. There were many different flowers, adding splashes of color everywhere and on each bush. The angel’s wings lifted and relaxed from his excitement, a smile growing on his face as he looked around the garden with ideas of what to make. “This is the royal flower garden. My mother made it years ago and I have been keeping it nice and growing.” Damien commented.

“Wow! Thank you for taking me here!” the sub-avian exclaimed, turning around and hugging the demon king tight, nuzzling his chest. He giggled a bit and let go, jumping up and down like a happy bunny. “I’m gonna go make you a flower crown!” Then the angel ran of into the garden, trying to find the best flowers and colors to match with his demon roommate.

Damien stood there and watched, happy with himself. He touched his chest were Keegan had nuzzled him and felt his heart throb in the good way. The little sub-avian was so cute and adorable. He sat down on the ground, awaiting the flower crown and let his mind wander again. He imagined the little angel sitting in his lap, either it on his throne, or in his bed and them just cuddling. He imagined pleasing the angel, giving him massages and maybe biting his neck in some soft places. He would show everyone that Keegan was his and his alone. He could hear the little squeaks Keegan would make as he touched sensitive spots. 

His mind then when a little dirtier as he imagined his angel in pure ecstasy and pleasure, squirming and moaning under his grasp. He could see how he would react to the slightly nips or touched, shaking with the feeling of being pleased spread all over his little body. Keegan would be covered in sweat and smell so good with the king’s scent rubbed all over him. He could hear him calling out his name and giving himself to him as they had their fun. He could see them cuddling afterwards, sleeping against each other and his little sub-avian clinging to him after that tiresome night.

The daydreams didn’t last long as a shriek knocked the king out of his thoughts. The shriek wasn’t human, so that means something was horribly wrong. Damien stood up and started running around the garden, looking for the little blue-haired angel. “Keegan!!” he called, being that he couldn’t see the angel anymore. “Keegan!! Where are you?!”

“DAMIEN!!!” The king of shadow demons felt his heart drop into his stomach when he heard Keegan scream for him. He sprinted off in that direction, having to claw at the ground to help him turn faster around some of the bushes. It took him awhile to find where the teen was, but he was furious when he heard Keegan’s voice in a begging tone. “Please...don’t hurt me!”

There was an avian holding Keegan up by his neck, seemingly trying to pull out a dagger to kill him with. The demon king felt rage boil in him as he watched Keegan start crying and slowly struggled to fight back anymore as the air was getting closed off. The king growled at the avian, forcing it to look at him and then roared, letting his claws extend out more and his teeth become sharper. The bone blade on the end of his tail whipped back and forth as the claws on his paws sank into the dirt ground. “Let go of the sub-avian and back away.” he hissed with rage.

The avian seemed to smirk at him and put the blade up to Keegan’s neck, daring to kill him. That’s when Damien’s rage exploded. No one touched his angel, not now and not in a million years. He charged and pounced on the avian, seizing their neck and pushing them to the ground as they dropped the small angel onto the ground of the garden. The king and the avian rustled on the ground, trying to hit or injure the other as they rolled around with each other’s necks in their claws.

Keegan gasped as air re-entered his lungs, coughing a bit as it came in too fast for his throat to handle. He sat back away from the fight and watched as the avian was able to get Damien on the ground and hold him there as it tried to find the dagger it had. The dagger was sitting next to Keegan’s leg and the little sub-avian didn’t know what to do. He looked at the king and was frozen in fear for what was going to happen. “Keegan, run!” the shadow demon yelled at him, struggling to say anything. “Go get Malcolm and Alva!”

But the little angel didn’t move. He was too scared to do anything. All he was doing was making a flower crown and this feathered thing came out of nowhere and started trying to kill him. Now it was trying to kill Damien and he couldn’t do anything about it. He looked between the dagger and the four winged angel in front of him and began to panic, knowing that Damien would either killed the thing and be severely injured, or be dead because of him. He didn’t want the king to be dead since he loved him so much. He had to do something.

Damien was whipping his tail at the avian, trying to get the stupid thing off of him, but it wouldn’t budge from strangling him. He clawed that the thing’s hands, hoping it was get off of him, but still it wouldn’t move. He growled louder as he saw the avian get another dagger from their side and pressed it against his chest. The king was a little shocked that this was how he was going to die. He was going to die with an avian strangling him to die in his own palace. It was a stupid way to die, but he couldn’t get the avian off of him. 

Suddenly, a blade poked through the avian’s chest and through where its heart was. The male avian, from what the shadow demon could see, froze in pain and slowly thrashed about. Damien watched as the male died on top of him with one of his own daggers through its chest. It took a moment for the king to realize that Keegan was over him now too, with the end of the dagger in his hands and shaking. The angel was panting and his wings were shaking as well, making him seemed shocked. Damien finally went wide-eyed when he found out what happened.

Keegan had just killed something for the first time in his life. The angel sat back and looked at his hands, which were covered in blood from the wound he caused. He looked at Damien, who was slightly shocked as well and instantly started crying. He made his hands into fists and hugging himself, his wings tucking down on his back as he shook in fear of what he did. He saw the king move the dead avian off of him and try to get closer, but freaked. “No! Don’t come near me! I’m a murderer! A monster!” he screamed at Damien.

The shadow demon became very concerned for the sub-avian, being that he was afraid that he would hurt him. “Keegan, it’s okay. You did a good thing.” the dark-haired male tried to explain, creeping a little closer. “Let me take you back to our room and we can rest, okay? You can make your flower crown for me tomorrow.”

Reality snapped back in as pairs of hands pulled Damien and Keegan apart. The king was stood up and held as Keegan was dragged across the garden floor to a spot not so far away. Damien knew what was now happening and freaked him. The guards most of heard the screaming and came to investigate. From their prospective, they must of thought Keegan was going to kill him with the dagger and acted accordingly to protect the king. They didn’t know about the little angel being Damien’s friend, so they had to get rid of any invading avians from the palace grounds. He tore himself away from the guards that pulled him up as the other guards holding the angel down on the ground took out their sword. 

The little sub-avian was crying against the ground, still shocked that he killed someone and that he was now going to get killed. He saw Damien and wanted to reach for him, to be safe and not held to the ground with his wings pinned down in a weird angle. He didn’t mean to kill anything. He just wanted to protect Damien. He cried out for the king and tried to struggle away, but it was too late for that. The guard with the sword stroked it down and sliced the object underneath it: an arm.

Damien held the angel tightly to his chest as he blocked the sword from hitting him with his forearm. The blade sliced a cut in it, but then slide off the rest of the way, not injuring the king of shadow demons or the sub-avian he held. The guards backed away with shocked as Damien sat back with a bleeding arm and Alva finally came running into the room. She started yelling at the guards to walk away and that Malcolm would explain everything later. The guards all nodded and walked back to their posts, leaving Damien to hold Keegan against his body and cradle him.

For the demon king, there was no sound outside hearing Keegan’s whimpers and cries. He ran a hand lightly through the angel’s hair to calm him. He scooped up the angel against his body and hugged him as the angel’s whimpers died down to peacefully sleeping. He whispered calm little messages into the angel’s ear and cuddled him for a while.

The day wasn’t supposed to end like this.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ultron tries to help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Damien sat in a chair as Alva stitched up his forearm, cradling the shaking angel against his chest. He didn’t like seeing Keegan like this, but he could see someone acting like this after they’ve killed something for the first time.

The little angel would seem asleep to anyone who couldn’t see hear how he was breathing. There was wheezing and small gasps interlaced with each breath and the teen was shaking heavily as he gripped the demon’s shirt. He couldn’t remember anything that happened when he had killed that avian, but he was a complete mess. He thought he was a good person. He thought he could never hurt anyone, even if they were a bad person. He didn’t want to hurt anyone, but he did and he couldn’t handle the daunting thought of it as he crying silently into the shadow demon’s chest, in and out of consciousness. 

“And done.” the redhead stated as she cut the last stitch off and backed away. She looked at her brother and wondered what was going on inside his head after the kid killed someone. She sighed, not getting the normal protest about closing his wounds up and grabbed a roll of bandages. “You want me to wrap it?”

“Sure.” the king answered back, still keeping his focus on Keegan. He felt his sister start to wrap his arm, which hurt a bit since the wound was still new, but he didn’t pay any attention to it. He watched the sub-avian in his lap turn into a little boy in his eyes who had just seen one of his pets die. He ran on hand through the fluffy blue hair on the top of the angel’s head to try and get him to look up at him. But to no prevail, it didn’t work. 

Malcolm came in a few minutes after Alva had finished wrapping Damien’s arm and walked over to his king. “My king, the guards have disposed of the avian’s body and how like to know about our other problem.”

“Keegan is not a problem, Malcolm.” the demon king hissed at his captain of the guard. “Careful how you use your words around me and him. He is a guest and under my protection, so don’t think that he is causing any of our problems. He’s my responsibility and you don’t have a right to say that about him.”

The other shadow demon froze for a moment before nodding and clearing his throat. “I wasn’t talking about Keegan, my lord, but I will keep your words in mind for later dates. I was talking about how the royal representatives have heard of what happened and want to speak with you on the fact that you are keeping Keegan here.”

Damien’s eyes widened and he groaned, a feral growl forming under it. “Of course they found out. What don’t they know? Right, I’ll set up a meeting tomorrow and they can talk to me then. My concerns right now are on Keegan and Keegan alone.”

The captain of the guard nodded and left, talking Alva with him since he knew he didn’t have enough sass and strength to confront the council by himself. He pulled the woman out of the room with him as they walked down to the meeting hall while leaving Damien there in the lab with his sub-avain. Yes, his sub-avian. Keegan was his and his alone. He wouldn’t let anyone take his angel away from him, even if he had to kill some of the representatives to do it. For now though, he shifted the angel in his lap and hugged him tight. “Keegan?” he whispered into his angel’s ear.

The angel shifted, looking up at the shadow demon with dead eyes and a blank look. He was damaged in his heart and soul, knowing that he did a bad thing and that Damien would probably punish him for it. “I-I’m sorry…” he rasped, nuzzling his face into Damien’s shirt as he cried a bit more.

“It’s okay.” Damien answered back, putting a hand on the teen’s blue tipped white wings and stroked him, playing with some of the feathers so that the kid would relax and calm down. “You did it to save me and I appreciate that. Thank you, Keegan.”

“B-But I killed someone… how can you not want to k-kill me after that?” the teen replied, looking up at the other male with tears forming and falling from his eyes. He looked down at his hands, which had been clean from the blood that was on them, but he could still see the stains in his mind. He clenched his hands into fists and started crying again, not knowing how to handle this. “I-I don’t want to have to cut off more feathers… it h-hurts when they grow back…”

“No one is going to be cutting off your feathers, Keegan. I promise you that.” the king replied, continuing to pet the angel’s hair and wings. “I promise no one will touch you while I’m here.”

The angel nodded, silently crying more into Damien’s shirt as he tried to calm himself more. He doesn’t want Damien to think he’s weak and can’t do anything for himself. He slowly settled himself and rubbed his face on the demon’s shirt, trying to dry his tears like a child would and then looked up at the older male with a bit of sadness still left in his face. He didn’t know why, but the demon calmed him and made him feel safe, unlike back home with his adoptive family. He didn’t want to have to leave, but knew that Damien might make him. “Y-You promise?” he asked, making sure he wasn’t right.

“I promise. You have nothing to worry about.” the demon king answered. He nuzzled the teen’s head and let him relieve more stress by shifting the boy to lean against his shoulder. Keegan’s head moved and nuzzled into the crook of Damien’s neck as he yawned a bit, crying making him tired. The sound of metal hitting the floor and hydraulics caught the king’s attention, making him look up to see Ultron coming out from the basement. “What’s wrong? Stretching your legs?”

“I heard someone had an accident today and asked Alva to unlock the basement.” the robot dog answered back, walking over towards the two sitting by the main terminal. There was a whimper from the angel as he tried to hide himself in Damien’s neck, not wanting one of his only other friends hating him too. The A.I. chuckled and sat at the demon’s legs, looking up past the pile of feathers in front of his muzzle. “Looks like I was right.”

“He’s recovering.” Damien pointed up, trying to get Keegan to talk to Ultron and make him feel better. “He thinks he’s a bad person because he killed someone, but he won’t listen to me on how he did a good thing by killing that avian.”

“Well he’s an angel, Damien. Literally. ‘Killing’ isn’t a word in his vocabulary.” the dog replied, glaring at the shadow demon. He hopped up to balance himself on Damien’s other leg and nudged the sub-avian lightly. “But Damien’s right, Keegan. You can’t just mope about this for the rest of your life and expect it to just get better. Damien and I have both killed people and have regretted it, just like you. We just learned to move on afterwards.”

“But that’s because y-you were brought up in t-that environment.” the angel argued against them. “I would never kill anyone, never. My parents would have kicked m-me out if I ever hurt someone, make me s-suffer.”

Something clicked in Ultron’s processor and he sighed, nuzzling the kid. “Welcome to the Parent Issues Club, Keegan. We all have them. Damien hated his dad, I hate Stark with a burning passion and you are afraid of yours. You’re not alone here. But you have to understand that no matter what happens, Damien will always stick his neck out for you, kid. He doesn’t think you’re a monster or a villain because he cares about you. He wouldn’t have brought you here to protect you if he cared about his reputation.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that exactly.” the shadow demon butted in, defending himself. “I still very much like my reputation, but I’m not afraid to protect someone and ruin it in-” The king was cut off when a paw was put on his mouth and he was shushed by the robot dog partially in his lap. He glared at Ultron and his ears drooped a bit. 

“Be quiet, King of Shadows. Let the robot works its magic.” the A.I. interrupted him and continued on his rant. “Look, Keegan. I know you feel like crap, but I went through the same exact thing after Vision kinda of killed me. I hid in the deepest of the Internet so no one could find me because I failed my programming and killed a bunch of people in Sokovia. I felt horrible and I felt like the best thing I could do was just erase myself, but you shouldn’t do that. You shouldn’t because this mass of fur over here-”

“-Watch it, Ultron!-”

“-I mean, King Damien helped me get a grip on my life again. He fixed most of the programming that Vision erased with the Mind Stone, with the help of Alva, and look at me now. I’m happy and I feel comfortable around people again. I’m even friends with a semi-human person, which I never thought would happen. Case in point, let Damien take care of you and he’ll make you feel better about this.” The dog smiled at himself, but that disappeared when the king of shadow demons was glaring at him with death and his eyes were completely yellow. “And I think I will leave now.”

The robot dog quickly made his escape to the basement doors before Damien could swat his tail at him. Before he went back down into his lair, he heard a faint “thank you” from the angel and smiled. Soon though, he went back into the basement and closed the doors behind him. Meanwhile, Keegan was smiling against Damien’s chest as the demon was fuming. The demon king was embarrassed at the fact that Ultron had made fun of him in front of Keegan. “Idiots. I’m surrounded by them.” he growled.

The angel laughed a bit, patting the demon’s chest to get his attention. “He was just trying to help, Damien. You don’t need to get so upset about him calling you a ‘big mass of fur’. He’s not wrong though, since your legs and chest are already really fluffy.”

“And you find that funny, do you?” the demon king question back, smirking. “You find it funny that I’m a big mass of fur and that I could probably hide you in my fur?”

The angel giggled and nodded, wings flapping and fluttering as he became happy again. The shadow demon chuckled and turned his claws to tickle the sub-avian’s stomach, laughter bursting out of the angel’s mouth as he tried to squirm away and make a run for it. “N-No! D-Damien! Stop it! Hahahaha! T-That’s not cool!”

Damien chuckled more as he took the teen down to the floor, eliminating the risk of him falling off the chair and tickled him more fiercely on the metal floor underneath them. He used one hand to pin the angel’s hands above his head and continued to tickle the angel as they both laughed hard. “You aren’t getting away from the Tickle Master that easily, Keegan!” he teased, drumming his claws on the boy’s checking stomach. “I am the champion around here and you will suffer my wrath!”

“N-No!” the angel replied, going along with the game as he tried to kick the demon, who was leaning over him all the way. “P-Please have mercy! Hahahah!”

After a few seconds, Alva and Malcolm came back in to see Damien on top of Keegan while the large shadow demon was tickling the heck out of the boy. His sister laughed, knowing that this would probably happen, where the captain of the guard was surprised his king would act like this. “The Tickle Master has no mercy, Keegan!” the human yelled to the angel on the floor. “I’ve learned that the hard way!”

After five more minutes, Keegan was completely exhausted and napping against Damien’s shoulder as Alva and Malcolm went over what the royal representatives had to say. “...They want to see Keegan and who he reacts with the public.” Alva finished off her explanation, Damien not looking to happy about that.

“They’ll kill him.” the king replied, knowing that for a fact. “I can’t let him go out there, not after the public finds out that he killed someone. They will never accept it."

“I know.” his sister replied, looking at the kid. “I know you care about him, but maybe you should just turn him back over to the humans. Erase his memories and just forget about him. It would be for the best, Damien.”

“What?! No! I’m not doing that!” the demon king protested. “The avians will kill him and they won’t make it swift! I’m not going to let Celeste get her talons on him, Alva! He’s too important to the future of this kingdom for that. He’s my responsibility and I will take care of him. I promised him that. The plan is to get him used to the society here so that when we can liberate the other sub-avians, they will see Keegan as an example. Also, I…”

“You what?” the woman asked, quirking a brow. It took her a second, but once she saw the blush on his face, she knew. “Oh! You love him, don’t you!”

The king shoved a hand on her face and shushed her, gesturing to Keegan, who was sleeping. “Quiet!” he whispered harshly at her. “I don’t want him to find out yet!”

The sister of the king nodded, but smirked as she sat on the nearest desktop. “Then what’s your plan? He can’t leave the palace, or he’ll be killed, but he can’t stay here forever or he won’t met the public. It’s not like we can invite the entire kingdom to met him at once.”

A lightbulb went off in Damien’s head as he heard that. “Yes, yes we can! That ball you suggested a couple weeks back. We can invite the kingdom to come to the ball and then they could meet Keegan there at a formal setting. They’ll see how much sub-avians can integrate into shadow demon culture and then they will accept him. The royal representatives could meet him on a first-hand basis and all I would need to do is stay with him the entire time and give him some lessons on etiquette. It’s perfect!”

“So when would we have it.” Malcolm asked, adding to the conversation. “You would need time to teach him everything he would need to know.”

The king thought to himself and looked at his angel, leaning against his chest and get another idea. “His birthday, which is a month and one week away from now. He’ll turn eighteen and his avian gene will kick in, making him really part avian. The public will see that he is a mature adult and then respect him a little bit more than if he was still a child.”

The other two nodded and Damien was happy with himself, thinking of him dancing with Keegan and them spending the night together. He nuzzled the angel’s hair and sighed, happy with his life.

✢✢✢✢✢✢

“Queen Celeste, I’ve brought news.”

The pure avian with the purple and golden-tipped feathers turned around to look at one of her spies, who had come back from a mission. She hummed, not seeing the other one she sent. “Where’s your partner?”

“The sub-avian killed her, my queen.” the avian with yellow feathers replied. “The demon king seems to have turned him against us.”

“That’s unfortunate.” she replied, inspecting her claws. “What’s the news then?”

“The King is holding a formal ball to integrate the sub-avian into their culture in a month’s time.” the spy reported. “All of the kingdom will be there and we have the perfect time to strike.”

“Excellent.” the queen answered. “Go tell the kingdom that in a month, the shadow demons will fall and the avians will have their days in the sun again. And when that day comes, I will prove to everyone that I was meant to rule in the first place, not my brat of a sister. That little sub-avian will be mine, and I will finally be able to kill him off.”


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien and Keegan go shopping.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

Keegan didn’t know what he was more excited about. The fact that he was going to have a party on his birthday or the fact that Damien was taking him shopping for some clothes to wear to said party. The only part he hated was he had to wear this stupid ban around each of his wings to cloak from them from humans.

They were in New York, since that’s where most of the good shopping centers were, but Keegan was a little scared. His wings were tucked against his back so that none of the humans walking by would bump into them, but he was also clinging to the demon king’s arm as they walked throughout the murky streets of the big city. It was cold out, Keegan wearing a big sweatshirt that covered most of his body all the way down to his thighs, but Damien was still wearing his royal top with no sleeves. Malcolm and the other two guards with them were wearing suits like regular security would wear, but they seemed a little hot on all of the clothing they were wearing and had swords strapped to their backs. He knew that they were demons, so maybe their body temperatures were higher than a humans.

The group of them made their way to a store, which seemed really nice and had a lot of beautiful clothes. Keegan was still holding onto Damien’s arm and thriving off of the heat he was providing as he looked around the store. Why was the king going all out for him? He knew it was a formal ball and he would need nice clothes for it, but he didn’t see why Damien needed to go out into the human world for clothes. He could have just gotten some from one of the stores in Domum, but the demon king seemed to have made up his mind. The angel became very nervous and shy, hiding his face in the taller male’s large arm.

The lady at the desk in the back of the store looked up and smiled, Damien smiling back at her. She stood straighter and bowed her head when he walked up. “Your highness, it’s good to see you here today. What can I help you with?” she asked, a warm smile on her face.

“I am looking for formal clothes for a friend of mine.” the shadow demon answered back. “Could you open up the store for us so he may try on some clothes for the upcoming ball?”

The lady nodded and clicked a button under the desk, unlocking the backdoor that said “Authorized Access Only” and guiding them to the door. She looked down to see Keegan at her king’s side and gave a short wave at him. The little angel gave a small smile and wave back as the group walked inside of the backroom. Damien moved forward from the group as the lights turned on and knelt down to show his sub-avian the room first.

Keegan looked around in awe at the store, the light orange and tan walls reminding him of most of the buildings he could see from the balcony gate in his shared room. The walls were lined with clothes made for ball events and formal meetings, but they were all in the shadow demon fashion. A lot of the clothing was in light shades of tan or other colors, but there were some light poppy clothing items around the store that seemed to fit more of the angel’s style. He looked back at his friend and seemed confused. “Why are you doing this for me?”

“Think of it as an early birthday present and because I care about you.” the demon king answered back, smiling warmly and kneeling down to the angel’s height. “You may pick out an outfit you want to wear for the ball. I don’t care what you get, but I do have to remind you that it will be the first time the public of Domum will see you, so choose wisely.”

Keegan went into a bit of shock for a moment. No one had really ever offered to get him clothes, since he didn’t have the money and other people didn’t want to spend it on him. The only time that someone would buy him clothes was when he needed bigger clothes for school or just to wear every day. His adoptive parents basically stucked and he had no idea how to handle the situation of someone important in his life going out of their busy day to take him shopping for an outfit to wear at his birthday party. A few tears welled up, making the shadow demon in front of him worried, but started to giggle with happiness.

“Thank you, Damien.” the sub-avian replied, jumping up and down a bit as he became a lot happier when he had been two weeks ago when his second traumatic incident happened. He ran forward and hugged the king of Domum, making the guards flinch and reach for their weapons. The angel pressed his head into Damien’s neck and nuzzled it, rubbing his tears away in the process. “Thank you.” he muttered again.

Damien motioned for his guards to stand down and let the sub-avian hug him. He was never really good at hugs, besides having a death grip on someone or shielding something from harm. He’s never really hugged anyone else but his mother and sister, but Keegan was a completely different story. He was as fragile as a human was and he could easily crack his spine if he wasn’t careful. So the king of shadow demons decided to just decided to give the teen a light pat on the back and call it good enough. 

“You’re welcome, Keegan.” he answered back, making a little distance between them. “Now go pick something out.”

The teenage angel nodded excitedly as he let got the demon king and went around the store, looking for something nice to wear. First, he took off the wing rings and put them on a chair as he went to scan the racks, letting his wings be visible again before he stretched and flexed them. He went over to some tunics and saw they were about Damien’s size, which meant they were about a large in men’s and Keegan knew he was a small in men’s. He looked around the store more to see the most of the stuff that what he supposed was the men’s section was too big for him, since they didn’t have a small size. He looked a little disappointed since the men’s tunics and pants looked really nice. 

After about five more minutes of looking around the store, the 17-onto-18 year old finally found something he wanted to try on. It was a small size, the same as his from what it looked like and had a sandy color to it that made it look almost like a peach tone. It was a tunic with no sleeves, but it had golden drapes of sheer fabric tied from the back of the shirt to two separate metal arm bands. The bottom of the tunic was cut in the v-shape, matching the small v-neck shape at the top. The back of the tunic was also open, so the sub-avian would be able to fix his wings through without having to cut the fabric. There were little light blue gems on the tunic with golden patterns and the angel’s wings fluttered with happiness.

Damien walked over after Keegan had flown up to grab the shirt, still a little wobbly since he hadn’t gotten back into the swing of flying yet. He had flown around the gardens a few times while the king had watched, making sure he didn’t fall, but he was good enough to do short little flights around the Royal Wing in the palace before getting too tired. The teen looked over at the shadow demon with a giddy smile as he held up the tunic carefully. The taller male smiled, shorter than when in his 7ft half form, but he was still about a foot taller than the angel.

“You found something to wear I see.” the king commented as he looked over it. He froze, having seen more than a few of the female guards wear this same tunic type on their days off. He smirked a bit, looking down at the angel. He seemed to not know at all what he had picked up and smirked. “Um, Keegan? You know that this is a female’s tunic, right? The cut is made to show off a female’s hips more.”

The blue-haired angel suddenly turned very red with embarrassment and worry. He really liked the tunic and he wanted to have it for the ball, but he didn’t want to make a fool of himself. He looked between the tunic and Damien, but saw that smirk the demon had whenever he liked something. The angel’s wings were fluttering and flapping behind to try and cool himself off, but he only got hotter and more bothered. “C-Can I-I still tr-try it o-on, p-please?” he stuttered, the words not coming out right.

The king’s smirk grew a bit wider as his tail flicked around behind him every so often. “I never said you couldn’t try it on, Keegan. It’s your gift, not mine. Whatever you want to get, you can get. I don’t care what your preferences are.”

The little sub-avian’s flushed face faded as a huge smile replied it, him jumping up and down with his wings flapping madly behind him. He ran past the king, making his way to the changing section of the store and closing the curtain as he went to change. It took Damien a second before he realized the almost adult didn’t have any bottoms to go with his shirt. The demon looked around and found a part of cargo shorts that would fit the angel, pulling them off the rack and throwing them on top of the curtain before taking a seat in one of the chairs. “Thank you!” he heard Keegan call out behind the curtain as he heard a rustle of feathers. 

The demon king’s mind started to drift as he waited for Keegan to be finished with his change. He looked over at Malcolm to see him and the guards looking at other clothing items in the store. He chuckled as the extra guards he brought walked over to the kid’s section and started picking out some accessories, the king knowing they had pups at home that would love them. If they couldn’t pay for them, he would be happy to cover the cost along with Keegan’s items. He had a soft spot for children, being that he wanted some demon pups of his own and he hated to see any form of child brought into someone else’s messes. Maybe that why he liked Keegan so much.

Sooner than later, the curtain opened back up and Keegan stepped out of the changing section with the tunic and the tan cargo shorts on. Damien looked back at the angel and froze, staring in awe of his sub-avian. The tunic fit nicely, if not a little loose, and the metal cuffs sat nicely above his wrists. The golden sheer fabric sat in front of his wings, but made it look like the teen was wearing a cape of some sorts. The shorts didn’t mess with the outfit, since these had no pockets and just the fabric type. They were a little baggy under the waistline, but it worked with the v-cut of the tunic. The jewels shined and the gold made the turquoise of Keegan’s hair and wingtips stand out even more. He looked like a prince and the demon loved it.

“Is-Is it too much?” the angel asked, looking at himself and seeming unsure. “I don’t want to make everyone hate me for wearing this.”

“Keegan, everyone in Domum wears this kind of stuff on a daily basis.” the king reassured the angel as he knelt down to the teen’s height. “You’ll be fine. You look wonderful with the tunic and the pants, even if it is meant to be worn by females.”

The angel went into a full blush again as he absorbed all the kind words and compliments the king was giving him. He looked down and smiled at himself, blushing more happily as he imagined himself dancing and flying around in these clothes. Of course, he won’t since they were for a formal event and he needed to kept them neat for the ball in two weeks. He looked up at Damien again and fluttered his wings as the demon chuckled back, happy that his guest was enjoying himself. The angel looked around the store and saw that there were accessories, too. “Damien, can I please get some earrings to match with the outfit?” he asked in his cutest voice.

The king’s face was covered with a light dusting of pink as he watched the angel leaning forward and give him that cute smile. Damien could only smile back and nod, letting the sub-avian go to change behind the curtain. Once finished, the angel bolted over to the accessories and almost ran into the guards. One of them came up to their king and raised an eyebrow. “Sir, are you sure pampering the avian so much is a good idea?” they asked. “What if he’s trying to get something out of you?”

“Hush, he’s not doing any harm.” the shadow demon rationed, smiling as the teen walked around the section with a huge smile on his face. “And I’m making sure he’s presentable for the public and the royal representatives. If he doesn’t at least met their standards, he won’t be allow to stay with me.”

The lights flickered once and caught Keegan’s attention as the hanging lights on the ceiling seemed to flicker. The angel’s wings twitched as he picked up a pair of small black hoop earrings from a shelf, making the teen shudder as he went to place his chosen accessory with his outfit choice that was laying on a chair. The angel tugged his sweatshirt sleeves down more on his arms as he watched the ceiling lights flicker more and the hairs on his arms rise as everything seemed to get very cold. He looked over to the shadow demons in the room and saw that Damien had his back turned, but didn’t notice anything off. 

“ _ Keegan~ _ ” a sweet warm voice echoed calmly throughout the room. “ _ Come here, my little angel~ _ ”

The angel froze, looking around as the lights flickered more and seemed to go into a dazed state. He looked at the corner of the shop to see a woman standing there with golden wings, with golden feathers as hair to match. The teen suddenly recognized the winged being as the person in his dreams, the one always holding him and nuzzling him all the time. It was his mother. The sub-avian smiled sleepily as he took a step towards the woman. “Mom?” he called out, happy.

“ _ Yes, baby. Come here. I want to hug you~ _ ” the avian called out, walking closer towards the teen and smiling brightly. The teen nodded, walking further towards the lady as he let his wings droop heavily. His vision was a bit hazy around the edges of his sight, but he seemed to be walking closer towards his mother with glee written all over his face. The woman opened her arms to the boy as he walked closer. 

“Keegan!!” The sub-avian stopped, looking back to see that the king of shadow demons was calling at him, if a little muffled. “Come back here now!”

The teen tilted his head, feeling light and bubbly as he shook his head and continued towards his mother. He smiled brighter as he decided to ignore Damien’s frantic yelling and walked into the lady’s arms, letting her hug him. This is all he ever wanted and he finally got it. Had Damien found his mother and brought her here for him to meet him? If that was the case, then why did he felt so drowsy and heavily all of a second. He felt the hug the woman was giving squeeze him tightly as he leaned down, supposedly to kiss his head. “ _ That’s my good little boy~ _ ” she whispered before hugging him tighter.

The teen giggled happily as he leaned up, but was violently ripped away an crashed on the floor with someone holding him tightly against their chest. He looked up with fuzzy olive eyes, vaguely seeing the figure holding him before he heard a loud, ear-bleeding roar from behind him, snapping him out from whatever trance he was in. He jumped, spastically looking around to see that the store’s lights were dimmed severely and Damien was holding him. “D-Damien?” he asked, throat feeling dry.

“Why aren’t you listening to me, Keegan?!” the king yelled, hugging the angel close to his chest. “I told you to get away from that thing!”

“What…” The angel cut himself off as he turned back around with tired eyes turning shocked as he witnessed the guards and Malcolm facing off with a giant snake lady with snakes for hair. He stared in fear and coughed a bit, feeling like his chest was crushing in on itself. He looked back at the king to see he stood up with the angel in his arms lightly, watching for a brief moment as the beast slashed at one of the guards as it charged. The sub-avian began to cling to the king as his wings wrapped around the both of them. “Damien,” Keegan asked with fear in his voice. “what is that thing?!”

“That’s a naga and it was trying to eat you!” the shadow demon yelled as he watched one of his guards get thrown across the room and crash into a wall. He decided this thing wasn’t going down by itself and placed Keegan on the floor, standing in front of him as he watched the naga whack both Malcolm and the other guard aside. He cleared his voice and growled ferally, “Hey!”

The snake lady looked at Damien, hissing as it advanced on him, stopping before him. The lady hissed as it leaned down to investigate the man. “ _ Who daresss take away my meal? _ ” she hissed again, baring her fangs to the king.

“Dracon Evestar, King of Shadow Demons, King of the Domum Empire, and Savior of Man.” the shadow demon growled back, baring his enlarged canines to the snake. “You inflicted pain upon one of my guests and I expect reparations.”

The Medusa-like creature laughed hauntingly as it moved its tail around to tap the demon king on the chest. “ _ You think that jussst becaussse you are the new king of beassstsss, you can control my actionsss? Your father would be very disssapointed. _ ”

Damien growled, grabbing a hold of the naga’s snake hair and yanked her down to his height, yellow light filling his eyes as his growl got louder. “Listen here, you scaly-ass witch. If you know my father, then you know he didn’t give out mercy to anyone who crossed his path. So I would like you to give me a reason to spare your pitiful life before I cut off your head and feed it to the lions!”

Keegan had only seen Damien get this anger once and it was with him. He peeked out from behind the king’s legs and watched as the demon’s claws got longer, seemingly read to kill the naga for her attempt to murder the boy. The angel looked at the now frightened beast and scanned over her greenish blue form to notice something different with her lower area. It took the angel a while before he realized what was going on and why the naga attack, but once he did he stood up and grabbed onto his friend’s arm. 

“Damien, stop! Don’t hurt her, please!” the angel cried out, trying to tug the arm holding the naga’s hair away from her. The shadow demon’s glare turned to the sub-avian’s with a confused and slightly angered look, but the angel continued his plead. “She’s carrying eggs! She was just trying to eat so she could keep her eggs healthy! She’s scared to death so please let go of her!”

The demon’s eyes seemed to fade back to their brown color as he looked at the slightly enlarged stomach of the naga, releasing her hair. The creature left back and wrapped her tail around her lower area to protect it, watching both of the figures with the same amount of fear Keegan had when almost eaten. She had tears falling, fearing that the king would kill her and her unborn young along with it. The naga met the shadow demon’s eyes and realized that he looked like he had just murdered his family, eyes wide in shock and tail drooping to the floor. “...I’m sorry.” he finally said, looking down at his claws before clenching them into fists. “I didn’t see it and I didn’t mean to hurt you… please forgive my brashness, miss.”

“Can we give her some food?” the angel seemed to ask for the naga, looking up to Damien with forgiving eyes, wanting to help and make things right between the two of them and the beast. 

“Of course.” the king nodded, opening up a Sender portal and letting a basket fall into his hands. He handed it to Keegan and the teen walked over slowly to offer the basket to the snake lady. She looked at him before snatching the basket and looking inside. There were an assortment of raw meats inside, large enough to feed her for a while. 

The snake lady looked up at the sub-avian and smiled a bit, hugging his gently before looking up at the mooping demon. She slithered over and cautiously hugged the shadow demon’s arm. She looked up at Damien’s sad expression and stood to her natural height, placing a hand of his shoulder. “ _ You are not to blame, ssson of Galaxiusss. I realized you, like I, were only trying to protect your loved one. Thank you for your offering. I’ll make sssure that your friend will not be hunted by othersss of my kind for being half-avian. I hope you can forgive me for my missstake. _ ” she apologized, bowing her head.

“No, I should be the one apologizing.” Damien argued lightly. “I never mention to put children in harm’s way. I seemed to have acquired my late father’s anger issues when becoming king. Please do forgive me if I harmed your unborn. If you would like, I can give you sanction in Domum while you await the laying of your eggs.”

“ _ That isss a generuosss offer, your majesssty, but I’d rather be in the sssafety of my kind. _ ” the naga answered, smiling now that she was more calm. “ _ But if you allow it, I will come visssit when my childern have hatched and allow you and your loved one to play with them. It’sss been a pleasssure.” _

The creature bowed again, holding onto the basket as she slithered off back to the corner of the room, disappearing into the shadows with her obtained meals. Keegan smiled, happy no one died, but was sad again when he saw that Damien had sunk to his knees in a shaking mess. The angel ran over, kneeling down and hugging the demon tightly. He was shaking and whimpering like a dog, tears running down his face. “...I almost killed her and her children, Keegan.” he whined, tag tucking in between his legs. “Maybe… maybe she was right. I am just like my father.”

“No!” the angel protested, nuzzling the demon’s neck as he hugged him tighter. “You’re kind and generous and you are the only person in all of Domum how cares about me right now! He gave me your room when you didn’t have to and you keep me fed and dressed! You’re even throwing me a birthday party! Would your dad do that for anyone he knew?”

It took the king awhile to answer back, but soon the whimpering and whining stopped. “...no, he wouldn’t.”

“Then that’s enough proof for me that says you’re a good person, Damien.” Keegan replied, rubbing the king’s back. “Let’s go home, my king.”


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Damien and Keegan spend some personal time together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoy!

“Now, if the royal representatives come up to us while the ball is going on, you are-”

“Damien! I know this already! We’ve done this lesson a thousand times! Can we take a break?!”

Damien looked at his bed to see Keegan was very exhausted, bored, and whiny. Everyday, they had been going through the etiquette and the rules the angel had to follow during the ball so that he could get through the night without a hitch, but of course Keegan was still a teenager and had no ability to pay attention or do anything. He tapped his paw as he watched the sub-avian make the puppy eyes at his glare. “Are you done making complaints so we can actually learn this, Keegan?” he asked.

The angel shook his head and made the shadow demon growl. Keegan crawled back towards the pillows of the bed and patted the furs in front of him, wanting the demon king to come sit with him. “Can we stop with the lessons today, please?” he asked, whining and curling his lip for theatrics. “I want to just do something fun and spend time with my friend.”

“We went shopping two days ago and that wasn’t fun for you?” Damien asked, walking around to lean against on of the beams of the bed frame. “Besides the naga incident, did you enjoy shopping with me and spending time with me that way? You need to know these lessons before we can do something fun. Okay, how about I give you a prompt and see if you can give me the correct response. You get them all right then I’ll spend time with you.”

The angel nodded and scooted back so Damien could sit down with him. The sub-avian was bouncing a bit and smiling as he watched the king sit down with him. “I’m gonna get them all.” he stated, flexing his wings a bit before folding them back down.

“Right.” the shadow demon taughted. “Okay, if you lose me in the crowd and have to go find me-”

“-stick to the edge of the ballroom and search for you that way so I don’t get stepped on or bump into anyone else.” Damien stared at the angel and his glare seemed to get narrower. 

“If someone starts talking to you and I’m not around-”

“-say that I’m not allow to speak to them without you with me and silently walk away.” Keegan answered again, smiling and giggling a bit at how frustrated he was with this. 

“What do you when a royal repres-”

“Bow and allow them to shake my hand if they offer. If not, stand there in silence until one of them asks me a question directly.”

“Keegan, let me finish the question first!” the king scolded, but that sent the sub-avian back into a laughing fit against the pillows, holding his stomach as he tried to breathe again. The shadow demon seemed to finally snap and pounced forward, taking Keegan’s wrist and pinning them as he watched the teen’s face go from happy to embarrassed and shy in a second. He growled a bit, making the angel whimper and try to struggle against his hands, but soon just laid down his body on top of him. “Fine, you win. We can have some fun.”

“Damien, get off of me!” the angel spat, making Damien chuckle as the teen started hitting his side. “You’re crushing me!”

“I’m not crushing you. It’s gravity and it’s slowly increasing on me.” the king replied, pushing down his body further onto the angel underneath him. He was smirking and chuckling until a knee came up where-the-sun-don’t-shine and knocked the wind out of him. He rolled over to the other side of the bed and gasped for air. “Ow.” he winced as he rubbed his thighs. “That was a low blow, Keegan.”

“You were on top of me!” the angel replied, a little anger but was now worried about Damien. He crawled over and sat with him, watching to make sure he was alright. He sighed sadly, knowing that he probably shouldn’t have done that and pulled his knees up to his chest. “I’m sorry, Damien.”

“It’s okay. I guess I’ve just been a little uptight these past weeks because of the ball.” the king replied, sitting up and smiling lightly. “Thank you for helping me loosen up a bit. Now, what did you have in mind of us doing?”

The angel blushed a bit, pulling his knees in tighter and burying his face into them. “I don’t know… um, whatever you want to do with me, I guess.”

“Whatever I want to do with you, hm?” he repeated, but in a more teasing tone. The blue-haired boy squeaked as he realized how naughty that sounded and regretted his phrasing. The shadow demon sat behind Keegan and moved him into his lap, placing his head on top of the teen’s and he hugged the little angel in his hold. “I was thinking we could unwind a bit. Maybe just hug and cuddle a bit, or I could even give you a wing massage, if you’d like.”

Keegan’s blush grew bigger and his wings came into full contact with the shadow demon’s chest. He looked back to see that he was smirking at him. The angel placed a hand on the demon king’s furry leg, kneading it as he just enjoyed the fact that his crush was hugging and offering to touch him openly without it seeming weird to him. He smiled, and nodded as he leaned back against the other male and relaxed. “Can I ask you some questions about you?” the angel asked, rubbing the demon’s thigh.

Damien opened one eye, being that he was enjoying the leg rub he was getting and looked at the flushed sub-avian in front of him. He chuckled as he stretched a bit, tail laying over the side of the bed as he leaned back into the pillows more. “Sure, just nothing too personal. I don’t think you’ve proven yourself worthy of that side of me.” the demon teased. 

“What are you? Thor’s magical hammer?” the teen joked, smiling at the larger male. 

The king groaned in disgust as he heard about the hammer, tail flicking up and his arms falling limp out in a star position. “Ugh, that ugly hunk of metal? It’s not even true magic! It’s a piece of metal forged in a dying star and that’s why no one can pick it up! Thor can only pick it up because his electrokinesis can alter gravitational fields, like Vision does! That’s the only reason they can pick it up and no one else can without putting some kind of gravity inhibitor on it!”

The teen laughed, turning around to face the demon he was sitting on. He watched the king get all huffy about the situation and cross his arms in front of his chest. Keegan rubbed the demon’s legs more and watched him shut up with his mumbled growls. He leaned up and propped himself up on his elbows. “You’re getting so upset over nothing, Damien.” the angel scolded lightly, giggling when the other male glared to him while smirking. “It’s just a hammer. Did the hammer do anything to you?”

The demon huffed. “No, I guess not.” He smiled and looked down at Keegan’s hands, which was still rubbing his legs. He growled, smirking and sitting up so he could use his hands to grab at the sub-avian’s wrist. As much as he loved the attention the boy was giving him, any longer and they would have a different problem on their hands over than fussing about a hammer. He watched the angel stare in confusion and chuckled. “You know if you keep rubbing my thighs, I’m going to start to think you want today to go somewhere~” he teased.

The blue-haired teen went into a full face blush and started in shock. Did Damien know he had a crush on him?! No, he couldn’t know! He never said anything about it and he was sure Alva hadn’t been teasing them lately. Was he blushing too much around him or did the guards overhear him when Damien wasn’t around? He looked down at his lap and tried not to think of all the times he’s imagined the king being his boyfriend, but it was hard when he was being held and was in his lap. He gulped as he realized how close the demon’s face was to his.

“What?!” he finally answered, shouting a bit too loudly. “W-Wait! Damien, please! I-I didn’t mean anything by that!”

“Then why are you so flustered then~?” the demon continued teasing, making the blush on the angel’s face larger and dark. The angel’s wings were flapping so fast that they made a breeze in the room and Keegan began to whimper as he tried to get his wrists free from Damien’s hand. After a minute of the intense flapping and whining, the king broke out into a chuckle and let go, the teen falling backwards with the momentum of his wings. The demon smiled gently as he leaned forward. “Keegan, I’m joking. I know you didn’t mean anything by it, so you can relax.”

A pair of wings came up and smacked Damien in the face, making him jump and fall backwards. The angel sat up, furying written across his face as he glared at the shadow demon as he coughed up some tiny feathers that got stuck up in his nose and mouth. The king spat as the feathers clung to the top of his mouth and teeth, having to whip them all out in the end. He looked at Keegan with a look that said, “what the hell?!” and the boy huffed at him. “I hate you.”

“Aw, you don’t really mean that right?” the king replied, mocking a sense of hurt and shock. He looked at Keegan’s face and then down at his wrists, wincing at the red marks there. He didn’t mean to hold him that hurt, but it was hard to not since he was struggling against his grip the whole time. He carefully took the sub-avian’s wrists in his hand and reached back with his other to grab a healing solution. He poured some in his hand and rubbed them together over Keegan’s hands. “I’m sorry if I really did hurt you.” he muttered softly, not looking up.

He took his hands away to reveal that Keegan’s wrists were back to normal, which made the angel gasp and smile. He leaned forward and hugged the other, ignoring the returning blush. “I’m sorry, too. I didn’t mean to make you upset, my king.”

“Don’t say ‘my king’, Keegan.” Damien commented, wrapping his arms around the angel in from of him and trapping him in a bear hug. “You’re not one of my servants or guards. You are a friend and I wish that you to call me by my name and not my title.”

Keegan giggled, hugging him tighter and leaning in to listen to the demon’s heartbeat. It was loud and beating like a bass drum, which was nice to hear and started to soothe the angel from his outburst. A breeze blew in from outside and cooled to room a bit more as the two figures hugged a bit longer before the sub-avian realized something happening in the king’s chest. “...are you purring?” Keegan asked out loud.

Damien stopped zoning out and realized that his tail was wagging behind him and that his chest was vibrating and making noises. His ears twitched as a blush spread across his face as he tried to stop the noise, only making it louder and more powerful. “Come on!” he groaned, ears drooping and his fangs bared.

“You are purring!” the angel bursted out, giggling hard as he pressed Damien backwards on the bed, making him sit on his tail. He bit his lip and roared a bit, moving his hurt appendage out from under him. Keegan leaned down against his chest and smiled, hearing the purring along with a groan from Damien. He looked up to see the king growling at the ceiling with all his might, making him laugh and cuddle up to his chest to hear more of the sound. “I like it, Damien. I makes you sound like you’re a cat, but you’re actually a lion inside. At least, that’s how I think of it.”

Damien stopped growling and looked down at Keegan with wide eyes and appreciation in them. Most compliments he got were about how good of a king he was and for only being king for seventeen years, he was doing a wonderful job. That’s the part he hated about being king. He didn’t want to be his father or be compared to his father in anyway, so Keegan’s comment was completely different. The metaphor the teen was using basically said that he was gentle and nice on the outside and the inside, but he could also be a lion if he wanted to be. His tail started wagging again and he smiled like he was a child again. “Thank you, Keegan. I appreciate that dearly.”

Keegan smiled back and rolled over onto his back, watching the king’s tail move up and down over the furs on the bed. “So… what were your parents like? The naga from the other day said that you were like you dad or something, so was he a nice king, too?”

Damien’s tail stopped wagging and the purring abruptly stopped as well. The king stared up into the ceiling and his face went blank with emotion. “My father was a cruel man that was hellbent on destroying every last avian he could find.” he answered, tone dull and monotone.

“O-Oh.” Keegan replied, sitting up to watched his roommate’s face. “I’m sorry for asking, Damien.”

“No, you should know.” the shadow demon answered back, sitting up and facing the angel next to him. He looked at Keegan’s questioning eyes and he sighed, not being able to not feel guilty for some things that his parents have done. “If you’re going to meet with the representatives, then you should know the history of what’s happened in the last thousand years when my father reigned over the kingdom.”

“But you already told me about how avians and predatorians came to be.” the sub-avian commented, remembering back to their first encounter and how Damien had tried to tell him about how they evolved from different animals. 

“No, no. I’m going to tell you about how I grew up. Why I have anger issues and why I’m trying to save you from being killed from the queen of avians, I want to tell you my story.” Damien replied back, watching the face of his angel frown a bit at the information. “So when I was born, my mother and father had been ruling over the kingdom for twenty years already. And back in the 9th century, the influence tha avians had on the world was very powerful and there was no real way to restrain them. One day, my mother came home with an injured baby from what is now Ireland after avians ransacked a town and used her ability to preserve living things to kept the child alive for 4000 years, which is the average lifespan of a shadow demon. That person is Alva, my sister.”

“So your sister is as old as you?” Keegan asked.

“No, Alva was one year old when I was about one hundred, so I was two back then.” the king corrected. “Anyways, my sister and I grew up with the heavy belief that all avians were evil and treacherous. My father taught me how to kill and hunt, and showed me how he ruled over the kingdom with an iron claw and I hated it. I hated that when people walked into the throne room, they cowered in fear. I had many fights with him and I didn’t think I could ever be like him. I didn’t think that I could be so merciless until I got into a fight with one of the females in my class. She was the daughter of one of the royal representatives and she challenged me to a fight. I wasn’t scared of her, but the thing the scared me was how fast I threw her and held her to the ground, threatening to kill her. Of course, I let her go after that and she’s still scared of me, but my father said he was proud of me and that made me hate him more.”

Keegan watched Damien rub his face with his hands a few times, trying not to remember. “I’m sorry your dad was like that. I mean, my dad wasn’t great either, but at least he didn’t encourage me to kill people.”

The demon king nodded and scooted close to the angel, picking up Keegan’s hands from his lap and starting to rub them mindlessly. He didn’t notice that the angel started blushing again. “I don’t know why he was such a bad person, but the kingdom was thriving and other shadow demons wanted me to be like him when I became king. So I started to be like him out of the public’s interests. My father and I would go into human wars and fight them, against my mother’s words, and I learned that humans were greedy and full of hatred, just like my father. After I had fought in WWII, I stopped getting involved with wars and started to act the opposite of my father. 

“But eighteen years ago, my idiot of a father went and started a cold war with the avians. He attacked their previous base and we went to war for a good two months. He brought me along by force and I finally found out what the avians were like. The pure avians, the royal family, and the regular avians were the evil ones, but they had sub-avians there that were terrified of us. Of course, my father ordered his soldier to murder them all. The queen at the time, not Celeste but Ruby, was hiding from the troops and I decided to go and find her. I did find her, in her living quarters with her older sister, Celeste. They were scared of me and I felt horrible.” Damien commented, pausing for a sec.

“Did… did you kill Queen Ruby?” the angel asked, holding Damien’s hands tightly as he noticed the shadow demon started to shake.

“No.” the king answered back. “I didn’t kill her. I had cornered her and her sister had been knocked up when I tossed a desk out of the way, but I couldn’t do it. I just stood there as I looked at her, her eyes filled with fear. I stabbed my sword into the wall beside her and backed away, giving her space to walk. She then started to talk to me. She knew I was the prince and she started begging me to make my father stop killing her children and kingdom, but I couldn’t do anything about it. I told her I couldn’t and I expected her to kill me, but she just hugged me and told me to never be like my dad, or I would kill an entire species when I was older. I wanted to hug her back, but an arrow was shot in the back of her head and she held onto me until she died.”

Keegan crawled forward and sat in the demon’s lap, nuzzling against his chest as Damien started crying and his voice quivered with sadness. The angel put a hand up to his face and stroked it, petting him to help him calm down a bit. He could feel how destroyed the demon was and he hated seeing his friend like this. “Shh, Damien. It’s okay. I wasn’t your fault she died.”

“Yes it was!” he yelled, a roar forming behind it. “I should have told her to run! But I just stood there! My father shot her, too. He walked in and saw her hugging me and my sword in the war, thinking that she was attacking me and killed her. The worst part was that Celeste woke up and saw her sister dead on the floor in front of me. My father had left me alone to get a grip on myself and go celebrate with his men, but Celeste thought I killed her sister. She started throwing things at me in a fury, but I didn’t move. She cursed at me and promised that she was hurt me like I hurt her, but I was already hurt. Keegan… I hated myself for the longest time after that and I never forgave my father.”

“Where is he?” Keegan asked, petting the demon’s chest quietly and blushing severely at what he was doing. He wanted to stop, but it helped Damien calm down from being so upset. “Where’s your dad and your mom?”

“My dad died of a plague that sweeped over the kingdom a year after the battle and my mother disappeared one night and never came back.” the king recalled. “I think she was angry with my father for putting me through all of that and decided to not stick around any more. I don’t blame her. But look at me now. I’m 23 years old, 1150 in human years and I’ve been king for seventeen.”   


“You don’t look bad for being over a thousand.” the sub-avian commented, fluttering his wings a bit and wrapping them around Damien. “And I hope you feel better. The ball’s in two weeks and I don’t think your subjects want you all moopy during it.”

“Since when did you become my royal advisor?” Damien asked, wrapping his arms around the angel’s waist. “Are you trying to trick me or something because you’re not the shy little avian I’ve seen for the past two months since you’ve been here.”

“I don’t need to be shy around you.” Keegan admitted, pressing his head into the crook of Damien’s neck. “And you’re also really warm and fuzzy.”

“I’m not fuzzy.” the demon argued back, pouting a bit as his tail showed otherwise, wagging happily behind him.

“You are too!” the angel argued back. “You have fuzzy legs and a fuzzy beard! And I think that make you look adorable!”

“I’m not adorable!” Damien argued back, trying to grab at the little angel before the teen jumped off his lap and moved around to near the door of the bedroom. 

“Try to catch me and persuade me otherwise!” Keegan taunted before taking off into flight and flying out into the hallway, laughing loudly as Damien chased after him.


End file.
